


The Bane of Skaia

by Sniperdoodle



Series: Exchange [1]
Category: Homestuck, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan, The Heroes of Olympus - Rick Riordan
Genre: AU, But its okay because now wes gots Dave, F/F, F/M, M/M, Post-Game AU, That one AU where Percy gets switched again because life likes to shit on Percabeth
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-14
Updated: 2015-07-05
Packaged: 2018-01-04 15:37:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 22
Words: 32,569
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1082749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sniperdoodle/pseuds/Sniperdoodle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It really begins when Dave wake’s up in a certain seaweed brain’s bed and suggests that Hera is the goddess of flamboyantly gay men.</p><p>	With no memory, Dave Strider is opened to the world of demigods and must face what demigods face everyday-it’s just that he’s not a demigod. He’s something else. And with a quest on his hands, no memories, and a task to defeat an undefeatable being that most certainly killed his Bro/Father, life seems harder than it should be.</p><p>Update: 12/9/14: (Graphic violence doesn't come in until Chap 18. I don't know why I'm telling you this)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dave: Fuck Goldilocks and Screw the Three Bears. This is real life.

**Author's Note:**

> EDIT: I decided that I wanted to make it closer to canon, so I got rid of the Davekat. I'm sorry to any Davekat shippers. I'm still a hardcore Davekat shipper, but I felt that this story would work better if I kept close to the canon material.
> 
> Also, if you remember what I had before I replaced the section in the first chapter, it just makes the whole thing even more hilarious.

So, the story goes that innocent Goldilocks is starving or somethin like that. She breaks into a house that belongs to Three Bears (as if the city would allow three wild and probably rabid animals to own property) and eats all their porridge (bears don’t eat porridge) and sleeps in their beds (which bears aren’t supposed to own). The bears come home from taking a community dump or something like and find that this stupid little girl had eaten all of their food and messed up their beds. They feel bad for Goldilocks and decided to become friends rather than eating her guts. 

But fuck Goldilocks and screw the Three Bear with their unrealistic stories. Fuck Mother Goose. This is real life. I’m goldilocks and apparently like the old man I’ve bumped my head on the bed and now I can’t remember anything. Also, the girlfriend of the guy who sleeps in this bed is pretty pissed and may go all rabid bear on me.

Let’s start from the beginning, though that was only a couple seconds ago. I can’t remember much after that but it’s easier to start when I woke up and could remember absolutely fucking nothing.

I woke up with the light from the rising sun filtering through the windows of the room I was in. after a yawn I looked around the room and what did to my wandering eye appear? No, I wished it was Santa Claus but instead it was a couple of freaks of nature. 

One of the three people gathered around me was part goat or something else, and another one was a cyclops because he was a giant and had one eye. The girl in the middle was scariest though because she had angry piercing grey eyes and a knife up to my throat.

The knife wasn’t my biggest concern. I knew that I could pull out Caledscratch out of my strife deck and disarm her easily using my speed and putting her in the position I was in now. I really had no idea what Caledscratch was mind that it was a sword or how I knew could disarm the scary chick mind that I knew that I was able to perform that feat or that I could access whatever a strife deck is mind that I could do that if I wanted to. I was more worried about whether I had clothes on or not.

“Am I wearin’ clothes?” I asked frantically. “Cool I’m wearin’ clothes. So, what’s up?” 

The three people assembled around my bed made no movement other than a rather surprised look in their eyes that I was not threatened by the knife in my face. The girl’s grey eyes quickly tempered over to the angry glare and asked me a question.

“Who are you and what are you doing in my boyfriend’s bed?” she asked angrily.

“Name’s Goldilocks an’ I thought that it was a bang-up idea to sleep in a stranger’s bed. I’m fixin’ to git some breakfast. How does porridge sound?” I answered that way because I knew that it would be ironic. I really had no clue what ironic meant other than that it was a literary device or how answering that question like that was ironic but it felt right. 

“Answer truthfully,” the girl order me, pressing the knife up closer to my neck.

“Dave Elizabeth Strider, Knight of Time an’ coolkid. No idea what those titles mean but they’re important. I have no idea why the hell I’m here in your boyfriends bed,” I answered truthfully not risking my life for a joke. “An’ I don’t know much more than that.”

The girl just glare at me before putting the knife away.

“Elizabeth’s your middle name?” the goat boy asked me as the girl started to angrily pace around the cabin. 

“Yeah,” I answered.

“What is happening?” the girl asked no one in particular. “Why does Hera need Percy in another one of her ‘exchange programs’?”

“Hera? Ain’t she the goddess of flamboyantly gay men?” I asked. Everyone in the room stared at me. “What? Not the right answer?”

“What else do you know about Greek Myths?” the goat boy asked.

“I knew that Zeus caused a shit load of trouble because he couldn’t keep it in his pants,” I replied.

“As angry as I am right now,” the girl huffed before she began to laugh. “But those two comments just made my day.” 

“You’re welcome, the Knight a Time is always here to make your day a bit more ironic,” I answered. “An’ who are you yucks?” 

“I’m Grover Underwood,” the goat-boy answered. “I’m a satyr if you were wondering. You’re probably the first person who hasn’t freaked out about me having goat legs.”

“I’m pretty sure I’ve seen weirder,” I said looking at Grover’s hairy goat legs.

“Tyson,” the cyclops said without further word.

“Annabeth Chase, daughter of Athena,” the girl introduced herself.

“Ain’t Athena a virgin?” Dave asked. 

“Yeah,” Annabeth answered. “It’s weird but she created my with her mind.”

“Well, we now know Athena has a pretty dirty mind,” I said out loud. “And I’m pretty darn sure I had a unusual birth too. I just don’t know why.”

“Are you from Texas?” Grover then asked.

“Ain’t you ever heard the phrase ‘Never ask a man if he’s from Texas. If he is, he’ll tell you on his own. If he ain’t, no need to embarrass him,’” I recited, not sure where I knew that from. I was pretty sure I was from Texas though; I had an accent and everything. I also knew Texas proverbs so if that isn’t a give-away then I don’t know what.

“So, no? Grover guessed.

“No, I’m from Texas, so thank you very fuckin much,” I replied as a small Mexican-looking boy came into the cabin.

“Oh look sleeping beauty’s awake,” he commented seeing that I was sitting up in bed and adjusting the shades on my face.

“Then you must be my prince,” I replied. “Too late. That goat boy already kissed me awake.”

“What?” Grover asked a bit surprised at being dragged into this.

“You. I like you,” the Mexican boy walked up to me to introduce himself. “I’m Leo Valdez.”

“Dave Strider,” I replied.

“The council is waiting for you guys,” Leo told Annabeth, Grover and Tyson. “And him too now that he’s awake.”

“Oh, the council,” I said pretending to act scared. “Are we goin to discuss what we should do with the one true rang? Cause I say we might should through it into the volcano.”

“I really like you,” Leo said laughing.

“No,” Annabeth said grabbing my arm and hoisting me up off the bed. “We are going to decide what we should do with you. And throwing you in the climbing wall seems like a good idea.”

“Climbin’ wall?” I pondered. 

“I oozes lava,” Leo informed me as Annabeth dragged me out of the room. 

“Well ya can’t have any fun in lava. Ya only die in lava,” I added as I left the room. Outside, I figured out that I was in a cabin and that I was stuck in a summer camp. Kids were running around with swords and other weapons, or playing volleyball and other games.

“This seems like my kinda camp,” I said happily realizing I had never been to summer camp. 

“Good, because you’re stuck here until you remember who you are,” Annabeth told me dragging me into a large baby blue house. She pushed me upstairs to a ping-pong table surround by kids my age and under. There was an old man in a wheelchair that looked like a teacher and a man sitting next to him who wore a leopard pattern tee-shirt and looked like he was previously drunk. I was introduced to everyone starting with the man in the wheelchair called Chiron. Next was Rachel Elizabeth Dare, Jason Grace, Leo Valdez, Piper McLean, Clarisse la Rue (she reminded me of someone but a little less creepy and not obsessed with spiders), Clovis (he was asleep), Travis and Connor Stoll (this camp’s version of the Weasley Twins), Butch (a big kid who reminded me of a sweaty guy but Butch wasn’t as creepy and his mom was the goddess of rainbows), Will Solace, Lou Ellen, Miranda Gardener, Frank Zhang, Hazel Leserque, Nico di Angelo, Tyson, Grover, and finally Mr. D. Annabeth sat me down in a an open chair between her and Clarisse la Rue who just glared at me like I was a plague. 

“This is Dave Strider,” Annabeth introduced me to everyone. 

“Howdy y’all,” I said in a very Texan way.

“Are you a cowboy?” Hazel asked confused with the accent. I sighed as if I had been asked this question a million times just because I had a Texan accent-and I think that I did.

“Sure, I’m a Vaquero. I ride Toros into the sunset as I use my reata to pull in little doggies. At night after I stop by the Icehouse I sit down on the llano and howl at the moons with the mavericks. No, I am not a fucking cowboy. Not all Texans are cowboys. Most aren’t,” I replied.

“Hazel and Nico are from the 1930’s,” Annabeth informed me.

“Oh, WWII then,” I said out loud. “Time travel’s always fun.”

“Not time travel,” Hazel informed me. “I died and Nico brought me back to the living.”

“And I got stuck in a time-quickening hotel for many years,” Nico added. 

“So not time travel,” I clarified.

“Not time travel,” Nico agreed.

“Ah,” I sat back to think about that,

“So, does Dave have a memory?” Jason asked.

“He has no memory,” Annabeth answered.

Everyone groaned at this news. 

“I remember some stuff,” I interjected. “It’s not clear. I know my name’s Dave Elizabeth Strider. My title is the Knight of Time an’ I’m a coolkid. Uh, let’s see. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen weirder thangs that a goat boy and I had a weird birth if you could call it a birth at all. I’ve seen friends an’ family die an’ I’ve seen horrible people brought down. It’s weird but I’m pretty sure I’ve died too, but I’m alive now. Oh, an’ I’m certain I’m bisexual. Sexual preference is always important.”

“Bisexual?” Hazel asked confused.

“I like both guys and gals,” I answered for myself. “I really don’t care about a person’s gender because they’re hot to me either way.”

“Thank-you for that information,” Annabeth said a little disgruntled. “Anything else? Any people?”

I closed my eyes for a second and a memory came rushing back. A single memory but it the happiest memory. Luckily, a name came with the memory.

“Karkat Vantas,” I whispered repeating the memory over and over in my head. “Karkat Vantas,” I said a little bit louder. 

“It seems that you’ve remembered something,” Rachel observed.

“It’s not much,” I admitted. “But it’s so clear in my head it’s like it happened yesterday.”

“What is it?” Piper asked. “It may have some clues about where you’ve been and where Percy is.”

“Probably ain’t anything useful,” I replied. “I remember us argin’ over something, both of our hands were on a pencil and we were both tryin’ to draw somethin’. I forget what we were drawin’, but there were just scribbles n’ dicks drawn all over the page. Karkat was yellin’ at me, and I was sayin’ somethin’ about a ‘penis Ouija’.” 

“Thank-you Dave,” Annabeth sighed.

“Anything else?” Mr. D asked.

“I don’t know why but this seems important,” I began to say. “I played a game once with my friends. A game called Sburb.”


	2. Dave: A game called Sburb

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After Dave gets dragged to the council meeting, he confuses everyone. Which is a normal thing for him, but he confuses himself also.

Mr. D spit his diet coke on the table. “You played what?!” he asked outraged. 

“Sburb,” I answered a little shocked that Mr. D was upset over a little game.

Mr. D was silent for a moment before he announced, “I have to go and talk to Zeus.” He then quickly disappeared in thin air leaving everyone there confused.

“What’s Sburb?” Travis asked.

“A computer game,” I answered. “Naw, not a computer game. It . . . it was more than a computer game, but a game none the less.”

“Very specific,” Annabeth groaned. 

“Here,” I grabbed a piece of paper and began to draw a familiar symbol of a house broken into five parts and a detached roof. “That was one of the Sburb symbol. The other one . . .”

I tried to figure out how to draw the other symbol until I looked down and realize that I was wearing it on a necklace. I held it up from under my shirt to show everyone it. “The other symbol was this. I though I’d lost this here necklace in lava or somethin but I’d guess not . . .” my voice dwindled off as I began to wonder what the hell I was doing near lava.

“Anything else you know about this game?” Frank asked me.

“A lot a people died in it,” I answered. “I made new friends and lost old ones. It’s not a fun game though, if ya can tell.”

“Then why would you play it if it wasn’t fun and people were going to die?” Katie asked confused.

“We didn’t know that it would be a death sentence,” I answered. “Me an’ three other friends . . . uhg, fuck not havin a memory. Well, we played the game together. People died. Friends were made. Hearts broken. Sights seen that cannot be unseen-well, unless you have no memory of them. But at the end, the greatest prize of all. If I could remember it I would tell you.”

“Do you remember anything about your parents?” Jason decided to ask a different question because we were getting no where with the game. “Because if you’re here then you’re probably a demigod.”

“Demi-what?” I asked confused.

“The offspring of a god and a mortal,” Annabeth explained. “Oh, and I seemed to have forgotten to mention that the Greek gods are real.”

I looked around the room at the assembled demigods (most likely) and stated, “Pretty darn sure I’ve seen weirder thangs still.”

“So what about your parents?” Jason restated.

“Pretty darn sure I have two,” I answered. “An’ they’re both biological. So no room for a god or goddess in there.”

“Then you must be able to see through the Mist,” Rachel commented.

“Not even gonna asked ‘cause I’m gonna be confused,” I stated sitting back and huffing. “So what am I supposed to do in my free time here?”

“Well, first off we have to figure out where you came from, who took your memory, and why you are here, along with where Percy went,” Chiron informed me. 

“I’m at a camp with a climbin’ wall that oozes lava,” I answered. “Can’t I have some fun first ‘fore we git down to the serious stuff?” Annabeth smacked me in the back of the head and everyone gave me a somewhat angry stare. “I guess not.”

“Well, capture the flag is today,” Connor reminded everyone. 

“Capture the flag,” I said in my head. “As long as I can use a katanna to smack down opponents then I’m fine.”

“We normally use weapons in capture the flag,” Clarisse informed me.

“Cool,” I said trying not to look excited but I failed.

“Alright, Annabeth if you could please give Dave a tour of the camp after we dismiss and take him down to the armory to get a weapon,” Chiron asked Annabeth who didn’t seem exactly happy with this task.

“I already got a weapon,” I informed Chiron remembering Caledscratch.

“Really?” Chiron asked confused. “May I see it?”

“Sure,” I agreed and I pulled it out of my Sylladex. Everyone gasped as I pulled a giant extending sword with an awesome clock in the hilt out of my Sylladex. “What? I the blade bent or somethan like that?”

“How did you do that?” Annabeth asked me.

“How did you get a sword like that!?” Leo asked me.

“Uh, I just pulled the sword outta my Sylladex,” I answered Annabeth’s question first. “Don’t y’all have one?”

“No,” Annabeth answered confused.

“Oh,” I thought for a moment. “I just thought that a Sylladex was universal. I don’t know how I got a Sylladex or this sword, but I do know that a Sylladex is a like a way of storing physical items electronically so you don’t have to carry them around, a inventory system if you will. You have your Captchalogue Deck which you can fill with useless stuff but then ya have your Strife Deck which ya can use for fightin’. You can program your Sylladex with a Fetch Modi to make it easier to access and store. I use Hash map 2 which I got from . . . well who knows where. But it’s easier than Hash Map 1.”

“Cool,” Leo just said.

“This technology seems almost futuristic,” Piper commented.

“Naw,” I laughed, because for some reason that just seemed funny in my mind. “If I was futuristic it would be branded with the Betty Crocker logo like a lil’ doggie.”

“Betty Crocker?” Will questioned the choice of Betty Crocker.

“It . . . just seems right,” I answered. “Somethan in my mind is a’yellin at me that Betty Crocker’s evil. Somethan to do with a’ evil fish empress. Wow, I sound crazy. Ignore that last line please.”

“Maybe if we see what else you have in your Sylladex we can figure more out about where you came from and will help jog your memory,” Rachel said ignoring the previous comment as I had asked.

“Sure, uh,” I began to pull items out of my Sylladex. “I have my Timetables, SBAHJifier, iShades, chalk, shitty swords, Turntop, headphones, some cans . . . the fuck is that?”

I asked the question as I pulled out what looked to be a rather crude puppet that was wrong on so many levels. Everyone looked at the stuff I had pulled out with wonder, Leo studying the technology closely, but I was more occupied with the plush puppet with a jutting ass and a dick-like nose in my hand.

“What is that?” Hazel asked confused at the puppet in my hand.

“. . . I have no idea. I don’t even know how this got in my Sylladex. The other shit I remember, but this . . .” I answered truthfully until the memory smacked me in the head. “FUCK!” I threw the smuppet up in the air and I fell backwards screaming like a little girl. 

“Dave!” Annabeth said scolding my screaming and moved to pick up the smuppet.

“Don’t touch the damn smuppet!” I said getting off the floor. “That damn thang and all its duplicates were scattered all over me and my Bro’s apartment when I was a kid. Bro had a business selling the demon puppet . . . sex toys on his puppet smut site! Gog, he would set traps an’ cover me with the shittin’ puppets.”

“Fun childhood,” Travis commented.

“Bro? So was he your brother?” Annabeth asked me. 

“He raised me,” I began to think. “But naw, he’s wasn’t my brother. He acted like I was just a annoyin’ little bro, but in reality I think he was my dad.”

“You said you had two parents,” Piper remembered.

“Yah,” I answered. “M’ mom was off a’raisin’ my sister . . . I think we’re twins,” I tried to remember but I couldn’t remember anything at the moment. Not the look of bro’s face, the name of my sister, why Bro raised me as a little brother, or why I was raised apart from my sister.

“It seems that objects or words,” Annabeth commented picking up the smuppet and throwing it in the trash. “Are helping jog your memory. Do any of these objects help you remember anything else?”

“Not at this moment,” I said catching the SBAHJifier (what does SBAHJ stand for?) from floating away and put it back in my Sylladex. “But, some a’ this stuff was probably put in my Sylladex to help me remember, or else the smuppet would be a’burnin’ in hell.”

“Who’s ectoBiologist?” Leo asked wearing my iShades.

“A friend,” I answered. “Everyone on that list-even the trolls-are friends.”

“Can I try and contact them?” Leo asked.

“Go ahead,” I answered starting to clean up the mess I had made by unloading my Sylladex.

“I can’t get a connection,” Leo answered.

“The camp doesn’t have Wifi Leo,” Piper reminded him. “Only in the Bronze room and Bunker 9.”

“No, PesterChum should work even if ya don’t have Wifi,” I answered. “I don’t remember how I know that though.”

“Hhm, well can I go back to the Bunker and try to get it to work?” Leo then asked me.

“Go ahead,” I replied.

“And we have a tour to get to,” Annabeth reminded me.

“Right,” I agreed with her and I followed her out of the room ready to see the camp.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Where did Percy go? I know. But I'm not telling you. Just watch Dave go on his tour and test his mangrit.   
> Also, I'm sorry if offending anyone with Dave's Texan accent. I am trying my best by gathering what I can from the internet. I have about four or five pages of notes on the Texan accent, so trust me, I'm trying.


	3. Dave: I meet Clifford’s hellish cousin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> More talk about Hera being the goddess of flamboyantly gay men.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a shorter chapter mostly because I'm trying to push on through to the stuff I want to write and I promised that I would update my stories that I have online so far.

“This is the fighting arena,” Annabeth introduced me to the Roman-like Coliseum. “And that’s Ms. O’Leary.”

“Math teacher gone wild, then?” I asked Annabeth looking down into the arena.

“No, the ‘math teacher gone wild’ title belongs to Ms. Dodds,” Annabeth laughed. “Ms. O’Leary has just always been this way.”

“A giant black dog from hell?” I asked.

“Yep,” Annabeth laughed.

“You seem to be handlin the absence of your boyfriend pretty darn well,” I observed Annabeth as I watched the giant black dog frolic across the arena squeaking a life-sized rubber yak. 

“It’s happened before,” Annabeth sighed. “Hera had switched him out with Jason to bring the Greek and Roman camps together. He was gone for six months.”

“So this time the goddess of flamboyantly gay men have switched me and Percy out so we can brang Camp Half-Blood and wherever I’m from together?” I guessed.

“Yep,” Annabeth answered. “Most likely.”

“You’re still takin this a little better than I might would have expected,” I observed still. 

“Well you’re not helping by cracking jokes about how Hera is the goddess is the goddess of flamboyantly gay men-which she’s not-and making jokes at every twist and turn no matter how crude they are,” Annabeth reminded me.

“True,” I nodded my head. “But don’t yah miss him?”

“Yeah, I miss Percy,” Annabeth answered. “Do you miss your friend? I mean, I guess he was pretty special to you since he was the only person you remembered.” 

“I don’t remember much about him thanks to this goddess making me a flamboyantly gay amnesiac,” I admitted. “But I’m not sure how good of a relationship we had if we were fightin’ over a penis Ouija.” 

“Hhm,” Annabeth thought about this for a moment. “Come on. We’re going down.”

“Sure, only if you have any crack,” I answered.

“No, down to the arena,” Annabeth informed me. 

“I knew that,” I told her. “You need to test my skill?”

“Well, yes,” Annabeth answered. “I already know you have skill by the way you held your sword and when you pulled your sword out went straight into a Japanese fighting stance.”

“My Bro did teach me how to be a ninja because he was one,” I informed her. “And he was a flamboyantly gay man so Hera has some connection to him, along with Elton John an’ Jack from Will an’ Grace.”

“You really know nothing about Greek Mythology, do you?” Annabeth questioned me.

“No fuckin clue,” I answered truthfully. “I did watch the Disney movie Hercules though.”

“That’s all wrong,” Annabeth replied.

“Are you tellin’ me that the muses were not sassy?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” Annabeth replied. “But Hera absolutely hated Hercules. She made him go mad and kill his wife and children; he then had to redeem himself by doing the ten labors.”

“And Hades doesn’t have blue flaming hair?” I asked sounding a bit disappointed.

“No,” Annabeth laughed. “His hair is more greasy than fiery.”

“Ew,” I replied. “So does he look like Snape?”

Annabeth paused for a moment taking this into consideration before answering, “Yes, just scarier.”

“I never want to meet Hades,” I answered as we finally made it down to the bottom of the arena. 

“So, draw your sword,” Annabeth instructed me as she pulled out a robot for me to fight.

“Why am I fighting a robot?” I asked as I pulled out Caledscratch.

“Because,” Annabeth replied. “It’s an automaton. Now, just fight it.”

It wasn’t much of a fight. The automaton and I seriously just ran at each and I sliced the thing in half.

“This is stupid,” I replied. “I just cut the thing in half. I thought I was supposed to be testing my mangrit.”

“First off,” Annabeth began. “The automaton was supposed to be unbreakable and yet you just sliced through it like it was cheese. That means that your sword is impossibly strong and sharp.”

“And?” I continued on.

“And you’ve stopped talking with a Texan accent,” Annabeth pointed out. 

“Really?” I asked her and as I began to talk, I realized that I was talking with what one could call a ‘normal’ accent. “Oh. No idea how that happened. Can we just move onto something else where I can test my mangrit?”

“Mangrit?” Annabeth questioned me.

“Mangrit,” I replied. 

“Alright,” Annabeth stood and thought for a moment. “I want the Hephaestus kids to see your sword since it’s nothing like I’ve ever seen and I don’t want you messing up anymore automatons.”

“Okay,” I replied. “So what?”

“I’ll be right back,” Annabeth informed me as she ran off to do something.

I huffed feeling a little left behind as Mrs. O’Leary came over and licked my face. She had dropped the toy yak off somewhere else and dropped a shield at my feet.

Putting my sword away I got up and threw the shield like a Frisbee, the thing that she possibly wanted me to do.

Luckily, I did the right thing and Mrs. O’Leary ran after it like a crazy train. She caught it and brought it back to me. I threw it a gain. Mrs. O’Leary chased it and brought it back to my feet. It went on like this for gog knows who long Annabeth was gone. 

When Annabeth finally came back, she had Jason Grace at her heels. Mrs. O’Leary waited for me to continue the game, but I was too busy trying to figure out why Annabeth had brought Jason with her. It should have been pretty clear though. 

“Dave,” Annabeth began. “You’re going to fight Jason.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dave or Jason? (You can vote if you want to, it may help sway my decision)


	4. Annabeth: Dave intensely raps about his feelings and other things

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The title says it all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I said that I wasn't going to update until after finals, but I've had a lot of time because I got ahead. So I wrote eight more chapters. They're short for my taste but in the next eight chapters it begins. 
> 
> As a warning, I cannot rap. I simply went onto a rhyming dictionary and tried to find things that rhymed. I am sorry, but Dave really needed to intensely rap about his feelings. I am sorry if I butchered rap.

            It was quiet a logical decision to get Jason to fight Dave. Or at least I think so. Dave was a pretty powerful guy, and you could just tell by standing in his presence. Jason was the second most powerful demigod, because the first one had disappeared. Again.

            This time Percy’s disappearance felt different for me. Yes, it was as much a surprised that he suddenly disappeared and I am trying not become an emotion wreck again. It’s just that this time I know how to deal with it, though I would be a little bit more depressing if Dave wasn’t trying to convince everyone that Hera was the goddess of flamboyantly gay men (that was one of the best insults about Hera I have ever heard and it wasn’t even intentional). 

            So anyways, I dragged Jason to the arena to fight Dave because I myself did not want to fight him. I was leading the blue team in capture the flag and Jason was leading the red so he may as well get a little beat up before the game while I see what Dave is truly made of. 

            “Dave,” I announced once I got Dave and Jason in the same place. “You’re going to fight Jason.”

            “What?” Jason asked. “You brought me here to fight him?”

            “Bring it,” Dave just said. 

            “I’m not fighting a mortal,” Jason argued.

            “Oh you wanna be that way then I’m not fighting a bastard son of Zeus,” Dave started. “Because I’m pretty sure Zeus is married to the goddess of flamboyantly gay men. Wait, didn’t Zeus once get it on with a cow or something? Or was he a cow then he got it on with someone. Wait, I don’t want to know. Bestiality and shit is gross.”

            After Dave’s short monologue Jason just looked at me like this was the reason why he didn’t want to fight Dave, insulting his father, Hera, and probably many gods in the future.

            “Just do it,” Annabeth commanded Jason. “I want to find out how much he knows about fighting.”

            “Alright,” Jason sighed. He pulled out his sword and turned to Dave, “Let’s make this nice and quick, alright?”

            “You sound like you don’t like me,” Dave scoffed pretending to offended. “But sure. Prepare to get served like a dude on butler island.”

            I sat back and watched to see who would try to strike first. The sky began to thunder and Jason tried to advance on Dave, by Dave jumped out of the way. And by jump I mean that he jumped like eight feet in the air before landing right behind Jason. Jason spun around and tried to swing at Dave, but Dave blocked it easily. Dave looked Jason in the eyes before jumping back and standing up not looking Jason in the eyes. Dave had a taunting look about his body manor adverting his eyes to the ground and slowly lifting his free hand to beckoned Jason to him. Then, he began to rap.

“Is that all you got Grace?

Then you might want to brace.

The Strider storm is coming your way

And we don’t give no time of day

You are gonna be served cold

So get ready to behold

The dirt you’ll find in your face

When you hit the ground in disgrace

Turn about turn around

The Strider show is in town.

So let the alarms sound

And give the king his crown

You’re nothing too big

Just a bastard son of a sky king

Show you startin’ a renege

Just get a taste of my sword’s sting

I’m the knight of time

It’s my time to rhyme

I’m in my prime

Don’t commit no crime

Just have to climb

Spent out on a dime

Cuze a dime’s all your worth

Just wait till you see my girth

See Davesprite’s fiery rebirth

Just taste the earth

My rhymes go worldwide

And you can’t hide

We’re at a national divide

Created by an evil pride

But I don’t need to abide

Cuze I have time on my side”

            It was curious to watch Dave rap as he watched Jason, it was almost like it was a chant that kept him going and gave him power. Even with Jason trying to distract Dave with lightning, thunder, and whirlwinds, Dave continued to fight. He defied gravity by jumping eight feet straight in the air, or jumping off of the walls of the arena like he was Spiderman. He not only used his sword but even kicked Jason in the face a few times.

            Even though Dave was a fighting machine, there was something dark happening as he continued to rap. The raps seemed to get darker and deeper into his memories, and I had no idea if Dave even knew what he was saying or recognized what he was saying.

“For this power I had to die

Become a god but don’t get no Versailles

Play the game where life is just a driveby

Death’s just another guy to defy

Watch the time see a lot people say goodbye

On the top of the world we thought we were so high

But nothing could prepare for the worst

To win we got kicked down in the dirt

And all we get is cursed

To keep these memories that hurt

Haunt out dreams at night

Where we loose without even a fight

The deaths we couldn’t save

The friends that lay in their grave

People we could’ve forgave

But a second is what we crave

This game has taken us enslaved

And even broken the brave

I’m no hero and will never be

Won’t every overcome the powerful seas

All could be destroyed by Condie

Where she controls oversea

The Felt’s stealing my mind

Taking my time to bind

Leaving her blind

Hope she could find

But she was left behind

Her heart is broken by love and hate

In the end all she was is bait

For the broken friendships that lay aside

By a friendship that in the end was denied.”

            Dave was heavily getting into the rap and I was tempted to end it because they were getting darker and darker as we traveled through Dave’s subconscious. In the end, it was not me that stopped the battle, but Dave himself. Well, not this Dave.

            Dave was continuing to fight Jason when suddenly a second Dave came up from behind Jason and tripped him up. Dave stopped his chant to look up at the second Dave not looking surprised.

            “Dude, lay up on raps,” second Dave informed the first Dave. “You don’t even know what you’re talking about. Yet.”

            “Alright,” Dave replied to himself. “Thanks dude.”

            “No problem bro,” the second Dave said before a red cog symbol appeared below his feet and travel upwards taking the second Dave back to wherever. 

            “What,” Jason began. “Just happened.”

            “My future self just tripped you up and stopped me from intensely rapping about my feelings and other things,” Dave calmly informed Jason.

            “Your future self?” I asked confused walking over to Dave and Jason. “And what were you even rapping about?”

            “No fucking clue,” Dave replied to the second question. 

            “So nothing about that one blind girl or the game that you remember?” Jason asked.

            “The game I was talking about is Sburb,” Dave answered. “I think that was an old rap I made a while back when I was alone. Well, not the Jason-taunting part of the rap. The Jason-taunting part of the rap I just came up with.”

            “Thanks, real genius,” Jason answered sarcastically. 

            “But everything else, I don’t know,” Dave finished up his answer.

            “So, then what about your future self?” I then asked.

“Myself from the future. He-or I-came back for one reason or another. I don’t know,” Dave answered.

            “So you can time travel?” Jason stood up.

            “Yes,” Dave replied. 

            I looked between Jason and Dave before stating, “Dave, you need to see Chiron.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoa, Dave can time travel!? Amazing plot twist. I bet no one saw that coming.


	5. Annabeth: A conversation of time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dave tries to explain the origins of the gods and Mr. D has a favorite?

            “Hhm,” Chiron thought for a second after hearing the whole story from me. Dave was doodling on a notebook he asked for. The page was covered in couplets, doodles of badly drawn people, and doodles of dicks. He didn’t seem to be paying attention, but then again I didn’t know anything about Dave.

            “Time travel?” Chiron questioned before he admitted, “Strange.”

            “Can I still play capture the flag?” Dave asked.

            “Yes,” Chiron informed Dave. “But still, I have never come across anyone who controls time other than my own father.”

            “Who’s your father?” Dave then asked.

            “Kronos, Titan of Time,” Chiron informed Dave. 

            “More bestiality, gross,” Dave said before going back to doodling. 

            “So are you saying that Dave is a spawn of a Titan?” I asked.

            “No,” Chiron replied. “But it is strange, for all Kronos could do was slow and speed time, not travel through it.”

            “I can do that too,” Dave answered. “But my specialty is time travel and the mastery of the time lines. I have a pretty cool friend who can stop and start time, freeze time for people, all that cool stuff. Also, whenever you say Titan I keep on thinking about that one anime called Attack on Titan with the Colossal Titan looking over the wall. Yeah, I keep on thinking as Kronos with a really creepy smile, no genitals, likes to eat humans for fun. Thanks for getting that image of your creepy dad who likes bestiality stuck in my head dude.”

            Chiron paused for a moment for once, having no idea how to reply to that, but moved on. 

            “For once, we are going to need Mr. D’s help with this,” Chiron sighed. “And I do not know when he will be returning. It may be days before we even heard of him.”

            “I’m back,” Mr. D walked into the room drinking some coke. “So what happened now?”

            “Dave can time travel,” I informed Mr. D.

            Mr. D took a moment to let that sink in as he observed Dave doodle on his notepad before saying anything.

            “Why are you drawing dicks?” Mr. D asked.

            “Because,” Dave looked up at Mr. D. “Every guy has an unnecessary compulsion to draw the thing that marks his manhood on everything his owns. It’s like a guy’s version of saying that this shit belongs to me. I have manhood. Look at my manhood. Also, since I’m a bisexual I’m just saying that I like this shit.”

            Mr. D looked at Dave confused for a moment before saying, “Oh. So that’s why some of the camp property is covered in dicks.”

            “Yep,” Dave agreed. “Though I haven’t drawn any. In permanate marker. Yet.” 

            Mr. D paused for a moment before saying, “I like you Dale Stretcher. So what were we talking about?”

            I tried to get over my shock of Dave explaining why I keep on finding dicks drawn on some blueprints hanging in my cabin and Mr. D saying that he actually likes Dave before I went back to the present subjects.

            “Dave can time travel,” I repeated.

            Mr. D took a long sip from his coke before asking, “A time player, right? And what did you say? Knight. Ah yes, Knight of Time. Very good.”

            “What do you mean by that?” Chiron asked.

            “Top secret information Chiron,” Mr. D replied. “Kinda like the Romans. Let me talk to Dave alone, alright?”

            Chiron thought for a moment looking between Dave, who was still doodling dicks, and Mr. D who really shouldn’t be left alone with a camper even if he claimed that he liked said camper. Chiron finally gave in because he knew that he could not defy the god of wine.

            “Alright Mr. D, have it your way,” Chiron sighed and began to walk out of the room.

            “What are you two going to talk about?” I asked.

            “Annabelle,” Mr. D began. “This conversation concerns a certain game Dare over here has played and an age-old secret. Not for your ears.”

            I sighed and Walked out of the room after Chiron, knowing that I could not defy the wine god myself, or he would turn me into a dolphin. Mr. D closed the door after I left and I waited outside the door.

            “So you have no clue about what they are talking about?” I checked in with Chiron.

            “No, I have no idea what significance the game Dave played,” Chiron replied. “Sburb. Or what the Knight of Time means. It is all a mystery to me.”

            “Do you think you have a clue about where Dave came from and where Percy is?” I then asked Chiron. 

            “No,” Chiron sighed sitting into his wheelchair. “For once in all my many years, I am completely lost.”

            We then sat in silence trying to find a hidden clue before Mr. D reopened the door and Dave left the room.

            “Everything is okay,” Mr. D said. “Time travel is a normal thing and Davy will be on Annie’s team for capture the flag. He’s also a god. Good day.”

            Mr. D then closed the door to brood leaving Dave standing in the middle of the room with a notepad and a book. 

            “What were you talking about?” I asked confused about what Mr. D had said.

            “Sburb,” Dave answered. “He kinda cleared some things up for me. I’m a god and everything.”

            “How?” Chiron asked. Dave looked like a normal person.

            “I died. On a quest bed,” Dave answered. “I think so. I kinda remember and Mr. D just filled in the holes in the story. It’s kinda like the rap. I died for this power. I died to become a god.”

            “This makes no sense,” I sighed.

            “Well you haven’t played Sburb, Mr. D can’t squeal, and I remember barely fucking anything,” Dave answered. “However, I can tell you whatever Mr. D told me because apparently the gods can’t touch me because I’m a god. It’s weird, but in the end it makes sense if you think about it. I’m a god of a world and if they do something to me my world will be fucked up.”

            “Just tell us,” Chiron urged Dave.

            “Well, here’s the shit,” Dave began. “I don’t like being cryptic so I’ll just tell you all the serious shit straight up. If you want to be a god, you have to die. That’s the first big things. Mr. D, Hera, Zeus and all those other gods played Sburb once. They lived on a normal world once too. They downloaded Sburb, played the game, died, and became gods of this universe. Hades and Hestia didn’t get god tier until they reach their new universe so that’s why they aren’t apart of the big twelve. The prize for playing Sburb is a universe. Kronos was their game’s cancer and Gaea was their big bad boss with the Titans and Giants being like apart of their gangs. So that’s how the gods became gods.”

            “That still makes no sense,” I sighed as I slumped in a chair.

            “Hhm, it may not make sense now, but in the end it may,” Chiron decided. “But, it is time to get the capture the flag game started. Care to join me?”

            “Yes! I’ve been waiting for this shit since I found out about it,” Dave exclaimed. 

            Chiron smiled at Dave’s hidden enthusiasm and declared, “Well then let’s go.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who would have thought that the gods played Sburb? How else are twelve strange beings supposed to end up as the supreme rulers of the world?
> 
> Also, of course Dave is Mr. D's favorite. It's ironic.
> 
> And Dave's theory of why guys draw dicks everywhere is simply why I think guys draw dicks everywhere. But seriously, why are they everywhere?! I even see them in the girl's restroom! What the actually fuck!?


	6. Annabeth: Let’s play a game

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dave gets to play capture the flag.

            I walked to the forest after grabbing some armor, and somehow I lost Dave on the way. My only guess is that he was following Chiron to get some armor. Anyway, all the campers were flocking to the forest and sorting themselves into their teams. I led the blue team as Jason led the red team. 

Jason, Piper and Leo had struck up a sort of unholy alliance and banded the Aphrodite and Hephaestus Cabin together along with Jason. They had also managed to get the Ares, Nemesis, Dionysus, Hebe, Hecate and Hades Cabin strung in with them so they were a powerful force. I one the other hand had the Athena Cabin, the Poseidon Cabin which consisted of Tyson and Percy, Apollo, Hermes, Demeter, Iris, Hypnos, Nike, and Tyche. We had good fighters and the children of the goddess of victory on our side, but Percy always seemed able to pull it through for us in the end. Without Percy here, I would say that my luck goes to the red team, but this time we have Dave.

It was Dave’s first time playing Capture the Flag but he would be good anyway. It’s an easy game to learn and the Blue Team needed him. After watching Dave fight Jason earlier I learned a couple things. One, he was a little bit messed up but that’s okay because what demigod hasn’t gotten rattled around in the head from all of the nightmare and the torture of monster. Second, Dave was an amazing rapper. Seriously. He’d put Apollo to shame. Third, Dave was an amazing fighter. Jason couldn’t lay a finger on him as they fought while Dave laid multiple blows on Jason. Finally, Dave could control time. Maybe his future self could come back and save Dave from being tagged. I don’t the extent of Dave’s time travel but at the moment he was the most powerful being in camp right under Mr. D. I knew that we were going to win this. I just had to find Dave.

I looked around the assembled masses of the blue team looking for Dave. Even though I thought he had followed Chiron, I now had no idea where he was. He should have joined the blue team, and hopefully he didn’t accidentally mingle with the red team. I was about to go and find Chiron when I hard Dave’ monotone voice behind me.

“Sup,” Dave greeted me after he snuck up on me. He wasn’t wearing any armor but instead had his sword out.

            “Don’t you have armor?” I asked him.

            “Don’t need it,” Dave answered. “I could wear a suit though. But not armor. Too clunky. I need to be able to move freely and feel the wind beneath my wings.”

            “Alright,” I sighed deciding not to deal with any of Dave’s bullshit. “So you know the rules of capture the flag?”

            “Yep,” Dave answered. “Don’t get tagged, bash heads, grab the flag, run back to your side.”

            “Good,” I began to tell Dave what to do. “Now just follow me. If you get the flag, then run.” 

            “Cool,” Dave agreed with those plans. “So do I have to stick right behind you like some clingy child who sticks to his mother or can I like have some distance.”

            “What distance were you thinking?” I then asked.

            “Not actually distance,” Dave tried to rephrase it. “But how about a height difference. I’ll be the Hawkeye of the operation and you’re Black Widow.”

            I thought for a moment thinking about the sexual tension between Black Widow and Hawkeye in the Avenger’s movie before Dave stated, “Hawkeye actually got married to Mockingbird in the comics. Captain America actually scored Black Widow in the Ultimate storyline.”

            “Alright,” I agreed to that. 

            “I’m gonna go and hide in the trees,” Dave stated before disappearing into the crowd. As the game was beginning to start, I stayed near the back of the group because everyone knew what they were doing. I just wanted to be able to sneak into enemy territory and find the flag. Dave could then run it back. 

            I heard the horn and teams crashed, people began to fight and I was able to sneak through the lines to search through the red team’s territory.

            I knew the forest like the back of my hand, but it was just a question of where they hid it. It was strangely calm in the forest where I was sneaking, and only every so often could I hear the rustle of branches above me. It was quiet minus the sounds of the sword clashing, until I heard a caw.

            “Caw, caw-caw,” I heard the sound. It was pretty close to a bird, but had a human hint to it. I looked up and saw that Dave was standing above my head on a branch. He pointed ahead most likely as a warning that someone or some people were approaching. He then pointed in a different direction, off to the left toward the shore. I nodded to let him know that I received the directions and went the way Dave told me. However, I wanted to see the troops coming so I put my invisibility hat on and waited behind a tree to see what was headed my way.

            Frank with two other members of the red team, both from the Ares Cabin, walked down the path. They were in the middle of a conversation as they patrolled the area or were headed over to my side.

            “Why is Jason sending us this way?” one of the Ares kids asked Frank.

            “Because no one is guarding over here minus Piper, Leo and Nico,” Frank answered. “And they’re at the flag. He just wants to make sure that everything in order.”

            That was all needed to know that the flag was in this area. They probably weren’t even going to say where the flag was so I waited for them to pass by so I could remove my hat so Dave could see me. As they passed, I looked up to see that Dave was staring directly at me as if he could see me. He then made a shooing motion with his hands like he was telling me to go. I had no idea how he could see me, but I took this as an opportunity to just walk around in my invisibility hat with Dave following me. 

            I walked in the direction Dave pointed me to and sure enough I came upon Piper, Leo and Nico all guarding the flag. It was unfair odds at the moment, but I figured that all I needed to do was distract them so Dave could grab the flag and run back.

            I walked into the small clearing and saw their red flag. I looked around for Dave but he was nowhere to be seen, probably already getting into position. I put my trust in Dave, and I took off my hat.

            “Hey Annabeth,” Leo greeted me as he, Piper and Nico turned to me.

            “Hello,” I replied. 

            “Well, let’s get this over with,” Nico said in his monotonous voice. Five skeletons appeared around him to help with the battle, Leo’s hands lit on fire and Piper pulled out her dagger.

            “Three on one is really bad odds,” Piper said before adding. “Sorry.” 

            They all advanced at once. As Piper had said, three on one were really bad odds, not counting Nico’s five skeletons. However, there had been worst odds.

            It was a balancing act to dodge Leo’s fire balls, the sharp edges of weapons, and the skeletons. But it was manageable. I just had to hold as long as it took for Dave grabbed the flag. However, I had no idea if he had grabbed the flag because I was too busy trying not to get caught. But in the end, Piper was able to grab my wrist, which ultimately meant that I was going to jail.

            “Wow,” Leo paused for a moment to think. “Is this the first time you’ve gotten captured?”

            “Yeah,” I answered.

            “Why did you come alone?” Piper then asked.

            I looked over where the red team flag once was, “I didn’t come alone.”

            “What do you mean by that?” Leo asked. Nico already walked over to the site where the flag once was a picked up a piece of paper left behind by Dave.

            “Wha?” Leo asked mouth gapping open wondering how the stealing of the flag slipped by him. 

            “What does the note say?” Piper asked.

            “It says ‘I. O. U. one flag and interest paid in dick doodles, Dave Strider’,” Nico read out loud. “And then there’s a rude caricature of Leo doing something to a skeleton.”

            “What?” Leo then asked taking the piece of paper out of Nico’s hand. His face scrunched up as he looked at the note, most likely the rude caricature, before stating, “Now that, is just not cool.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dave would just beat everyone at capture the flag and do not try to deny me.


	7. Jason: Winner to Loser

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dave gets a cape and a skull. Not Jason's skull though. That would just be too messy.

            This game of capture the flag was actually finally my chance to win.

            Now, I missed Percy as a friend. He was a really cool dude and we were close bros. Him disappearing again just sucked because it was unexpected, no prophecy or anything, and we didn’t know who was behind it or where he was. It also sucked because instead of Percy, we got Dave.

            I’ve only known Dave for less than half a day but he just gets on my nerves. I don’t like his raps, his jokes are too offensive, his Texan accent annoyed me (but now he is strangely speaking with a normal accent), and I can’t stand how he doesn’t take anything seriously. I don’t like Dave, and I can tell that he doesn’t like me.

            Anyway, this game of capture the flag was my chance to win without Percy here. Percy and Annabeth had always been the dynamic duo. They were a well-worked machine that could run forever as long as they were there for each other. But since Percy is missing again, the machine can’t function. That meant that I could win. It was a cynical way of looking at things, but I haven’t won a game of capture the flag yet and the subject’s been getting kinda sour with me. 

            So, there I was at that moment, running back to the north side of the forest with the flag in my hand, about to claim victory. I was sweating hard because I had layers of armor on and I was sprinting. I finally made it to the edge of the forest at the creek about to claim victory, but standing on his side of the forest was Dave Strider with my team’s flag wrapped around his neck like a cape. He was wearing my flag as a cape. 

            “Do I look good Grace?” Dave asked me as I slowed my pace and walked up to him. He had no tone in his voice, but yet it felt like what he said to me was very mocking.

            “Dave refused to let me end the game until he saw you running up,” Chiron stated with Mr. D standing right next to him. “And then Mr. D insisted that I listened to Dave.” 

            “Your face was funny,” Mr. D informed Jason. “When you saw that you’ve been defeated again.”

            “Picture-perfect moment that will be imprinted on my lack of memory forever,” Dave added. Piper, Leo, Nico, Frank and Annabeth soon joined them at the clearing.

            “So you did win,” Frank said. “Again.”

            “That was a very rude drawing Dave,” Leo informed Dave. “I will cherish it forever.” 

            “Thanks, good to know,” Dave replied. 

            “And I like your cape,” Leo then added.

            “Can I keep it?” Dave asked Chiron.

            “Sure,” Mr. D replied but the question wasn’t for him. I began to get a sense that Mr. D was favoring Dave over every other camper for one reason or another. Actually, this was the first time I had seen or heard Mr. D favoring a camper. And Dave wasn’t even a demigod. 

            “Until the next game,” Chiron added. 

            “Cool,” Dave said just walking off before asking. “So what now? Do I get a party or something?”

            “Sadly no,” Chiron informed Dave.

            “Aw,” Mr. D sighed. “A party would have been nice.”  
            “You know, we could have a rave party, bust out the glow sticks, flashing lights, bang out to awesome music. Yeah. That would be fucking cool. I tried to organize this rave party once but there were only like eight people including myself.”

            “Why?” I then asked.

            “Because everyone else was dead, and no one wanted to socialize with this one guy. I think he was hiding in the vents. And I also think that he was a clown,” Dave stated pausing to think for a moment.

            At that moment, a satyr came into the forest with a large box with an address. He paused and informed Chiron, “This box is for Dave Strider.”

            “Cool and cape and now a package for me? Awesome,” Dave stated taking the box out of the satyr’s hands.

            “How could you have a package sent to you after only being at camp for a couple of hours?” Annabeth asked watching as Dave slit the box open with his sword. Inside was a large ram’s skull with large curling horns.

            “Annabeth, I think the more important question is why anyone would send someone a ram skull,” Leo told Annabeth. 

            Dave wasn’t caring about why someone would send him this or how someone sent him this before anyone even knew he was at Camp. He was more preoccupied with putting the skull on his head.

            “Look, I’m that one guy who rips out people’s hearts from Indiana Jones,” Dave stated before walking over to me and nudging the skull into my shoulders like he was ramming me. “Ram-a-lama-ding-dong.”

            I was about to kick Dave in the shins but I noticed something painted on the skull of the ram. I then decided to ask, “What is that painted on the skull?”

            Dave removed the skull from his head to get a good look at it. He thought for a moment before stating, “It’s the Aries sign. You know, like in the zodiac? I had a friend who was an Aries. She was an archeologist and she liked dead shit too.”

            “Dead shit?” Piper questioned.

            “Yeah. We both collected dead things,” I replied. “I had this whole awesome collection of dead things. And now, I have a fucking ram’s skull. That is fucking awesome. Aradia’s going to be so jealous.”

            “Her name’s Aradia?” Nico asked catching on the name.

            Dave looked up surprised that he just spit random information out before continuing on, “Yeah, Aradia Megido. She was another time player. I don’t know why I was given this. We never really talked. But who cares I’ve got a ram’s skull!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Jason doesn't seem to like Dave. Could this be the start of something greater? Something . . . black?


	8. Jason: Dave, International Man of Mystery Part One

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We try to learn a little bit more about Dave, but he's just a little bit too happy with his apple juice to care if he's shirtless or not. And Jason still does not like Dave.

            After the game, it was time to eat. In the mess hall, the Seven plus Nico had their own table. It was like a reward for saving the world. We all had our own seat but this time, Dave sat in Percy’s seat. 

            With Dave there, it kinda felt awkward, mostly because he just kinda sat down because he didn’t know where else to go. He was still wearing the cape and had placed the ram’s skull in the middle of the table. He didn’t seem too surprised by the magical food, but he was pretty happy with endless supply of apple juice. 

            Dave was on his fourth cup of apple juice (man he was going to have to go later) when we actually got food. Everyone at the table but Dave stood up to offer some to the gods.

            “Yo, where are you guys going? Is it the skull? Do you guys not like me?” Dave questioned as campers started to walk up.

            “No, we’re just offering some of our meal to the gods,” Hazel explained.

            “Oh,” Dave thought for a second. “Make sure you give some to me. And Mr. D too. He seems unloved. He’s actually a pretty cool dude.”

            Annabeth rolled her eyes as we went up, presented the offering and came back to start eating. Dave was already eating his meal which consisted of a large hamburger and Doritos along with his unnatural obsession of apple juice. His sleeves were rolled up so you could see what looked like the fringes of a wings inked on his elbows. I was about to ask that but Annabeth asked a question first.

            “Dave, how did you see though my invisibility hat?” Annabeth asked.

            “Your what?” Dave asked with a mouthful, some of the half-chewed hamburger flying onto the ram’s skull. 

            “My Yankee’s cap,” Annabeth elaborated.

            “The thing you put on during the game?” Dave asked. “Yeah, I thought that that was pretty fucking weird. You just putting on a hat and standing in the open while no one around you could notice you. To answer the question I have no fucking idea. Striders have good eyesight, but not that good.”

            “You could see through the invisibility hat?” Piper asked.

            “I see dead people too,” Dave replied as a joke and a pop culture reference but Hazel took it differently.

            “Wait so you can see actually see ghosts?” Hazel asked.

            “Right now? No,” Dave answered wiping some hamburger off his lip with his wrist, showing off the strange orange feather on his elbow. “But, I can faintly recall meeting some ghosts. They had white eyes and looked normal other wise. I don’t know how though. Still, I really feel like I know nothing now.”

            “What’s that on your elbow?” I finally got to ask.

            “Which one?” Dave tried to look at his elbows, but only showed off that his elbows had the same feather ink on it. 

            “Is that a tattoo?” Leo asked.

            “Let’s find out,” Dave replied before getting up and taking off his shirt without any warning. Hazel shielded her eyes and many campers looked over with confusion. Dave turned around with his back to the seven to reveal that he had a large tattoo of orange wings on his back stretched across hi shoulder blades and down his arms.

            “Cool,” Leo said.

            “You’re too young to have a tattoo,” Annabeth noted.

            “But Hazel, Frank and Jason have one,” Dave protested.

            “These were burned into our skin,” Frank informed Dave. “Upon joining the roman military.”

            “So there are now not just Greeks, but Romans?” Dave asked. “Sounds bloody”

            “It was,” I replied.

            “I think my favorite roman emperor is Caligula,” Dave stated sitting back down, not bothering to put his shirt back on, but he tied the cape around his neck again. ”Mostly because he was crazy and he made a horse the roman equivalent of the president. And that horse had a mansion.”

            “So you know nothing about mythology,” Piper began. “But you know Roman Emperors?”

            “Yes,” Dave answered. “Well just Caligula. I think I learned that because my Bro liked horses. And I think that he made me a baby bid out of horse leather.”

            Hazel spit her drink out and cried, “Why would he do that?”

            “Well the horse was kill in a Meteor crash,” Dave replied. 

            “Was your brother slash dad crazy?” I asked.

            “A porn artist yes,” Dave began and Hazel had another disgusted look on her face. “A ninja who trained me by strifing me on the roof. Had hidden cameras all around the apartment. Smuppets. So yes. You could classify him as crazy.”

            “Are you remembering more stuff?” Annabeth asked.

            “Yeah, just talking about it,” Dave replied. 

            The dinner conversation seemed to end there. Soon, I was sitting in Bunker 9 talking to Leo about someone, Dave to be exact.

            It was a feeling that I couldn’t explain, that from the first moment I laid eyes on Dave, something inside me snapped as though all the hatred I had was aimed at him. I hated Dave even more than Octavian.

            When I told Leo this, he just laughed at me.

            “You’re just jealous,” Leo laughed as he messed around with a new invention. “A new blond-haired and most likely blue-eyed coolkid walks into camp without a memory? Jealousy.”

            “No,” I replied.

            “Please, and he’s funny and the supreme swordsman, so I can see why you’re jealous,” Leo continued on. “Seriously, he’s one of the funniest kids I’ve ever met-excluding myself. And he defeated you in the capture the flag game. He has a kickass back tattoo. You are totally jealous because Dave is totally awesome.”

            “I am not!” I continued to protest. “He’s an asshole who insults the gods, he knows nothing, and his ego is as big as Olympus. Did you hear him at the offering? He said to offer some to him. He’s also dangerously powerful. Leo, he can time travel. _Time travel._ The only other person who can do that is Kronos! Do you not smell something fishy?”

            “I can’t smell anything over the smell of jealousy,” Leo declared. 

            I grumbled and sat down, finally declaring my final opinion, “I do not like Dave.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yes, the headcannon that Dave got a tattoo of orange bird wings on his back after Sburb is eternal.
> 
> But something is growing between Dave and Jason, almost something . . . black.
> 
> (I will not stop doing that after Dave-Jason interactions until we actually get to that part, which will be a long time from know until Dave remembers quadrants)


	9. Dave: Could I finally have a normal day? Nope. Not in a long shot.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dave gets a prophecy and has to do something. But too bad the prophecy is really vague to everyone but Dave. Well, it would be clear to Dave if he has his memories. But he doesn't. At least he remembered that the Black Queen and Jack Noir are hate fucking each other!

            You know, I’ve heard stories about how kids have sat around for a long time before they have to go and do something when they get to camp. Like take Percy Jackson for example. I was chatting with his best friend Grover today and apparently it was weeks before Percy was ‘claimed’ and sent on a ‘quest’. You know, very advanced camp vernacular. 

            So it was my first full day at camp and nothing really happened. I hung out with Grover who gave me the complete tour, I got to watch some of the camp activities, eat and at the end of the day it was time for the campfire.

            Ah yes campfires, it was the time of day where we all gathered around the amplifier to sing our campfire song song. However, I was greatly disappointed when I found out that we did not actually sing the Campfire Song Song but instead sang crappy Greek Myth renditions of already crappy songs. And I really think that basically only the Apollo kids joined in and everyone just sat there and watched shit burn. 

            Well, that’s what I was doing. As crappy music filled the air I leaned back and drew dicks as I watched the fire burn. I was sitting in the front near Chiron, Mr. D and Rachel. I also got to hang out with Rachel today and she was pretty cool. She was an artist, a mortal, and sometimes randomly spewed green smokes and told life-threatening prophecies. 

            So over all a really cool chick.

            So I was drawing doodles until the singing ended and it came for the end of the day summary.

            “So now ends another day at camp,” Chiron began. “In the past two days, we have gained a camper, Dave Strider. As you all know, Percy Jackson is missing and has been replaced with Dave.”

            “So now what?” a girl named Drew asked who happened to be a bitch. “Are we going to look for Percy or are we going to just let Dave stand here in his place?”

            I turned around, looked at the girl who spoke and informed her, “But I’m sitting.” 

            “Why is Dave here?” another camper asked.

            Thankfully, Rachel had the answer.

            Sadly, the answer was done in rhymes.

            Rachel stood up in a rigid body posture as green smoke tumbled around here and she spoke in a voice that was definitely not her own.

 

_“The Knight of Time travels with wisdom and storm_

_A quest for the White Queen’s lost ring they must perform_

_Watch out for the Hound of Derse back_

_The feared servant of the Black Queen Jack”_

 

            Rachel then fell back into the chair and everyone looked at me flabbergasted.

            “Those couplets fucking sucked,” I just said trying to cool down the reaction to the prophecy but no one said anything.

            “This is the first time a mortal every received a prophecy,” Chiron observed.

            “Well, I’ve been trying to tell you-and the boy agrees-he’s no mortal!” Mr. D informed Chiron.

            “So what does it mean?” a camper asked. Annabeth looked like she was about to talk but I cut in for her.

            “It means that Annabeth and Jason have to come with me to find the White Queen’s ring which enables any carapace who wears it to have the power of the four prototyped sprites if we’re talking about the human’s Beta sprites because if it’s the troll’s we’re screwed because they had twelve while the humans only had four. We have to find Jack Noir, the Black Queen’s agent and the guy she hate-screws. He stole the ring from the Black Queen and now he’s a giant dog-crow-cat-jester-squid-princess-invincible thing. Don’t ask me anything else because I have no fucking idea what the hell a sprite is, or who the Black and White Queen are, or what is a carapace, or why Jack Noir is so powerful. But I do know why the Black Queen and Jack Noir are hate-fucking each other; it’s because they fucking hate each! Yep, bad pun but I am sure about one more thing. I killed Jack once already. And it’s going to be fucking impossible to kill him again.”  
            “Jack Noir?” Piper asked me. “Noir is French for black so you’re talking about a monster named-”

            “Jack Black? No, it’s Jack Noir. And it’s not a joking matter,” I began after hearing some campers giggle. “He killed a lot of people. He killed my Bro, my sister’s mom, and my friend’s dad all in cold blood-along with killing thousands of more. He merciless and bloodthirsty. He’s a cancer. And it’s a cancer almost impossible to stop.”

            Everyone looked at me with grave eyes but I couldn’t do anything about the truth. There was no more information to be given. Annabeth placed a hand on my shoulder to comfort me. 

            “Do you have any idea where the ring is?” Jason asked me.

            I closed my eyes and racked my brains but nothing came to mind. I was close, a memory away, but nothing came up.

            “No,” I answered.

            “So we have a quest without a destination,” Annabeth sighed realizing how hard this would be. “Quests always have destinations, so why is this one different?”

            “Maybe because the ring is not on this Earth,” Rachel answered regaining conscience.  
            “This Earth?” Frank asked confused.

            “It’s somewhere else out there,” Rachel said looking up in the sky. “Somewhere.”

            “Somewhere where I’ve been,” I added looking up. I recognized the symbols of the zodiac printed out into the night sky, but there seemed to be stars missing, like they were not my stars. “Or else I wouldn’t have gotten this quest.”

            I looked back at the crowd and stated, “We’ll need transportation. I don’t know why but I’m thinking a giant battleship. You guys probably wouldn’t have any because I’m talking about a giant flying battleship-”

            “We actually do,” Leo said wondering how I guessed that. “But I’m the only one who knows how to fly it.”

            I thought for a moment, “Well, since this is an informal quest-I’m guessing again-because I’m not a demigod or a legacy of one, then I could use a crew.”

            “It doesn’t say that in the prophecy,” Chiron informed me.

            “Well, I may have killed Jack Noir but I didn’t do it without a little help from my friends,” I replied. “At least seven friends were behind me. And I heard from a little goat that a crew of seven once worked together in a famous prophecy.”

            The seven demigods who played a crucial role in the previous Great Prophecy smiled at each other (expect Nico, he doesn’t smile) and seemed happy to be back together even though Percy wasn’t with them.

            “Frank, Piper, Leo, Hazel, Nico, I request your help on this quest,” I asked them formally. 

            “Sure,” Frank said and everyone else nodded their heads-even Nico surprisingly. 

            “We embark in the morning,” I stated.

            “But we have no idea where we are going,” Frank reminded me.

            I paused for a moment, “I have a good feeling for where we should start.”

            “Where?” Leo asked.

            I looked around the campers surrounding me and stated, “21605 Fir Drive, Maple Valley, Washington.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A quest! A quest for the holy ring! Ah, I love quests. But it seems like everyone is frustrated about this one because WHERE THE FUCK IS THE WHITE QUEEN'S RING LOCATED?!? IT DEFINETLY CANNOT BE ON A GOLDEN DREAM PLANET SO WHERE ELSE COULD IT FUCKING BE?
> 
> AND WHY DON'T THEY SING THE CAMPFIRE SONG SONG AT CAMP HALF-BLOOD CAMPFIRES? THAT JUST PISSES ME OFF SO MUCH!


	10. Annabeth: I get a visit from the spectacularly ironic Dave Strider

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dave visits Annabeth, Dave has a rose which is supposed to remind him of something, and Annabeth tries to prepare for a quest but Dave is asking disturbing questions.

            Getting a quest right out of the blue was not fun to prepare for. First off, this prophecy was very vague about where we need to go. It was very straight forward though about one thing-get the White Queen’s ring and avoid Jack Noir. It was clear that the prophecy said that we had to watch from Jack Noir and avoid him is possible, but Dave seemed to have convinced himself that we need to kill him. Other than that, everything was confusing and the only person who could understand it all was an amnesiac. 

            Also, I didn’t like the idea of the ring we needed to get not being on Earth. Where else would it be? Dave looked like he knew, but no name or picture came up. And the address Dave gave us? How did he know it down to the house? What is so important about 21605 Fir Drive, Maple Valley, Washington? Questions trapped me like a coffin and the problem was burying me alive with a slim chance of surviving. 

            Questions without answers plagued me as I did my best to prepare for this quest-but I didn’t know what I needed. I was about to go to Dave when he came to me.

            “Yo Annabeth,” Dave said sneaking up on me . . . again.

            “Why are you always coming to me?” I decided to answer a plaguing question and get it answered and out of the way.

            “Because you remind me of someone I trust,” Dave answered. 

            “Aren’t there other people you trust?” I asked.

            “No,” Dave scoffed. “I hate Jason, Piper can tell me to do anything and then I will do it, Leo’s a little fireball and a little too energetic, Hazel’s clueless about modern times, Nico’s Goth, Frank is . . . well Frank, Chiron’s part horse, Mr. D looks like he’s drunk most of the time, and the only person I was beginning to trust just told me that I had to go up against the monster that killed my Bro again. Also, no one really gets me.”

            “Hhm,” I tried to see his point, but I was hard to. Dave had obviously been through more than anyone here at camp so of course it would be hard for anyone to get him. But I still didn’t get why he trusted me. “So who do I remind you of?”

“You remind me of my sister. You both have blond hair; you’re both smart and most often time’s know-it-alls. When someone asks a simple question you both go off on big long speeches, you both have something you’re really good at-for you its architecture and for her it’s psychology, you aren’t afraid to hurt the ones that hurt the people you love and when you both get angry, your eyes turn a shade darker,” Dave highlighted some of the key information. “And you’re both snarky broads who don’t deal with no shit.” 

            “You seemed to remember a lot about your sister,” I observed not going to remark about the snarky broad part because that would just prove his last point.

            “Almost everything except a name,” Dave said pulling a rose out of his Sylladex. “I found this on my bed. I don’t know why.”

            “A rose on your bed?” I took the rose out of Dave’s hand. “Maybe it’s like the ram’s head given to you that remind you of Aradia, this is supposed to remind you of something.”

            "Yeah,” Dave replied. “But I have to ask your something important. You’re not a virgin, are you?”  

            “What?!” I asked him surprised that he was asking personal questions.

            “Come on Annabeth, you’re a heterosexual girl who has a hot boyfriend-from the pictures I’ve seen-and you’re almost eighteen. You’ve had to fuck a couple of times.”

            “Why do you need to know this?” I asked him angrily. 

            “Because I slept in a bed that belonged to your boyfriend,” Dave reminded me. “And I want to know if you’ve slept in it too.”

            “We’re not allowed to be in a cabin alone for said reasons,” I informed Dave.

            “But you could have done the do elsewhere too,” Dave reminded me. “And you don’t look like a virgin.”

            “How do I not look like a virgin?” I questioned Dave.

            “Just can tell,” Dave answered me. “Like how I can tell that Nico’s a gay little fucker and he’s a virgin. Leo’s not exactly bisexual but he doesn’t really care and he’s a virgin. Frank waves his Heterosexual flag around like a crazy patriotic redneck and has probably never felt horny in his life unless he became a rhino-which he hasn’t. Hazel’s from the 1930’s so she still upholds virginity and she upholds heterosexuality too. Would you like me to continue?”

            “No,” I told him ready to change the subject. “But what do you think we need for the quest?”

            “Weapons,” Dave began. “Clothes are always good but they’re optional. Something to entertain yourself of course. At least five computers on your person at all times like any sensible person. A couple phones work too. Movies and shows because it’s gonna be a long trip to get across the country and movies are always good. Fuck, I don’t know.”

            “Fine,” I sighed. “Then do you know why we need to go to 21605 Fir Drive, Maple Valley, Washington?”

            “That was a friend’s house,” Dave answered. “Maybe it can jog my memory, because I’m pretty sure that at that house our game of Sburb started.”

            “And we’ll go wherever we need to go from there,” I guessed.

            “If that doesn’t help me then the next stop is my apartment in Houston,” Dave answered. “Then my sister’s mansion in Rainbow Falls, New York, then my other friend’s home on an island in the Pacific. If that doesn’t help . . . then we’re screwed.”

            “Maybe other clues will show up like the rose,” I answered looking at the rose. “Maybe someone’s name was Rose.”

            “Too obvious,” Dave scoffed plucking the rose out of my hand and putting it in his mouth. “See you bright and early,” Dave said through the rose before waltzing out of the room in a dramatic and ironic exit. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why did Dave get a rose? Who is it supposed to remind him of? Well, it's definitely not there to remind him of someone named Rose.
> 
> And yes, clothes are always optional on the Argo 2.


	11. Annabeth: The flight of the Argo 2 under Captain Dave

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's time to go to this mysterious address in Washington and Dave had a dream he tries to explain but ends up talking about gay time-traveling green guys. 
> 
> Now with a special guest appearance from Andrew Hussie!

            The morning we all assembled on the Argo 2 before take-off. Everyone was there except Dave. Chiron had shown up with Mr. D. The only thing we needed was Dave.

            “I thought he was supposed to be leading this quest,” Jason grumbled looking off for Dave.

            “Yeah, well, I am leading this quest,” Dave poked his head from bellow the deck. “I got here early because I wanted a good room-but all of them were taken so I decided to bunk in the stables because it seemed obviously vacant of horses.”

            “You’ve been here the whole time?” Leo asked.

            “Yeah,” Dave answered. “And I have some news. I had a dream last night.”

            Everyone groaned and Dave looked confused.

            “Demigod dreams are never good an often predict the future,” Chiron informed Dave.

            “Yeah, and Freud said that if you see it in your dreams, then you want to fuck it,” Dave retorted. “That doesn’t make Freud right.”

            “So if you saw your parent in a dream . . .” Hazel was trying to comprehend.

            “If you saw anything that looked like a human that Freud said that you wanted to fuck your parent,” Dave answered noticing the horrific looks dawning on most of the demigod’s faces since they had often communicated with their parents in their dreams. “Again, doesn’t make him right. Anyway, my dream.”

            “Anything bad?” Frank asked.

            “No, let me talk. Captain Strider commands you to shut the fuck up and let me talk,” Dave told Frank.

            “Captain Strider?” Jason questioned.

            “Well I am leading the quest and I’m the only one who knows where the hell we’re going to I’m the Captain,” Dave informed Jason.

            “I thought you said that you didn’t know where we were going to end up?” I asked Dave.

            “Now I do. I would tell you what and how I got this information but I can’t get a word in so if everyone would just shut the fuck up then I will talk,” Dave commanded.

            “I like this kid, this Dane Stroller,” Mr. D whispered to Chiron.

            “Alright, so it began like this,” Dave began to retell his dream. “I was at a divide between a city of gold and a city of purple on the purple side. I was wearing a really cool set of red PJs and I had a cape and everything with a red cog symbol on my chest. I looked up to see Percy Jackson on the other side of the divide-the golden city. He was wearing what looked like gold silk PJs that also looked totally sweet. I looked to my right and I saw Jack Noir standing there. On my left was a green skull dude named Lord English. Above me on a giant flying red battleship was an alien with orange horns and black body suit that had a giant pink Pisces symbol on it, carrying a double-sided trident name the Batterwitch.  Looked back to Percy and standing in between us was this strange orange guy. He looked scared, though he had no mouth, just white eyes and a nose. He started to freak out and was yelling at us ‘It’s happening again! Again! Seriously! Jack Noir, Lord English, and Condie! Doc Scratch, Sn0wman, Spades Slick! All of them! AGAIN! They’re going to destroy both universes! You have to stop them from destroying Earth and Skaia! Prospit and Derse! Past and Future! Go! Before they do something bad!’ Then the purple and golden cities began to break apart as the images of Lord English and the Batterwitch disappeared. Jack was wearing a golden ring with four pearls on it, and emitting from the ring were lengthy red tendrils breaking the two cities apart. As I saw the cities being destroy I heard the one dudes voice yell ‘Get Jack first!’. Then I woke up.”

            “‘A green skull dude’ and ‘an alien with orange horns’?” Jason questioned Dave's descriptions. ‘he had no mouth, just white eyes and a nose’. This dream seems nonsense.”

            “But I’ve been to the purple city before-Derse, it’s called. I’ve never been to Prospit-the golden city, though,” Dave told Jason. “Also, the Batterwitch, Lord English, I had to fight them and kill them! You know how I said Jack was the cancer? Well, Lord English and the Batterwitch are even worse than him! I don’t know who they are or why I had to fight them but they’re worse news than Jack.”

            “So what do we do?” Piper asked Dave.

            “We go after Jack,” Dave answered.

            “But what about Lord English and the Batterwitch?” Frank asked.

            “We leave them until we regroup up with my friends . . . wherever they are and . . . whoever they are,” Dave said. “We’re gonna need more firepower if we’re going after the Batterwitch and Lord English along with their armies. Meaning Lord English’s gang of gay time traveling leprechauns,” Everyone was silent for a moment in confusion. Dave finally spoke up, “Wow, that sounded a whole lot more threatening in my mind. Well, anyway. We’ll deal with Jack right now. He’s our main problem.”

            “So where are we going?” Leo asked. 

            “After we jog my memory some more,” Dave began. “We go to Derse.”

            “Derse? How do we get to Derse?” I asked.

            “No fucking clue,” Dave answered. “It has something to do with dreaming but I don’t know.”

            “So we all go to sleep and end up on Derse?” Nico questioned Dave.

            “No, we need to take the Argo 2 to Derse somehow,” Dave answered. “Somehow. But let’s just go to 21605 Fir Drive, Maple Valley, Washington for now.”

            “Good luck,” Chiron bid a final farewell.

            “Try not to die,” Mr. D added.

            “Also,” Dave had one final thing to say. “I have no idea when we’ll be back since we’re going to go into another universe, so don’t get you hopes up that we’re dead too early. But, if I die make sure that you burn my body in apple juice.”

            With those words of assurance, Chiron and Mr. D left the Argo 2 as Leo prepared to take off.

            Dave turned to the crew and said, “Mr. Valdez, Warp 10. Full speed ahead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So they're off. And Dave will make as many Star Trek references as he can.


	12. Annabeth: FUCKING IMPS.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The title explains everything.

            Three days into our travels and I was restless. Mostly because it was a strange experience so far. We were nearing our first destination and no monsters have attacked.

            Since there was eight of us, Dave decided that we needed to split the shifts into four, so two people per six hour shift. It was nice to have a six-hour shift because then you had eighteen hours to sleep or do something you wanted. Though, usually on a quest there wasn’t much time to do something you wanted because monsters were attacking you at every corner. It wasn’t so with this quest because we haven’t seen any monsters, which was really strange. Though, the quest altogether was strange for many reasons one of them being Dave.

            Right now, Dave’s strangeness isn’t the point. It was my shift and Dave paired himself up with me because he trusted me. Currently, he was at the helm playing around with Leo’s music collection while pretending to drive the ship though Leo put it on autopilot. I was standing in the middle of the deck looking around. It was a pretty nice day over Idaho. The sun was shining and the clouds were speckled over the sky as the sun was rising. A cool breeze blew through my air as we passed below the clouds and above the ground below. It was a rare peaceful moment. 

            Dave was rapping along to the Eminem song until he paused leaving an awkward silence with only the blowing wind making the single noise. 

            “What’s the matter Dave?” I turned to the leader of this quest.

            “Imp,” Dave said slowly walking away from the helm and towards me.

            “What?” I asked.

            “Imp,” Dave repeated pulling his sword out.

            “What is an imp?” I asked him.

            “Behind you,” Dave instructed me. I turned around to face a small black creature with white squinted eyes and small sharp teeth hanging on the mass. His fingers were clawed and he wore patched jester clothes. It hissed as Dave came closer before launching himself at Dave Strider. 

            Dave made the battle short by slicing in imp in half with a clean move. The imp disappeared and what looked like a large blue gusher dropped on the ground in front of Dave. He walked over it and it disappeared. 

            “Get everyone else up,” Dave instructed me looking around. “Imp’s don’t travel alone.”

            I wanted to ask Dave a million questioned but I decided to just go and get everyone up. Leo installed a bell to wake everyone up in the dinning area. I ran below deck and rang to bell. Leo and Nico were the first ones to get off their asses and come and see what the problem was. They were still awake because their shift came before ours. Then, Jason, Piper, Frank and Hazel hauled themselves out of bed after Leo, Nico and I went above deck to help out Dave. 

            “What’s attacking?” Nico asked when he and Leo joined me. 

            “I don’t know,” I answer truthfully as we went above deck. “Dave just said that there will be more coming.” 

            And Dave was right. More of the imps came. Dave was being flooded by an army of imps, each looking more like a hodgepodge of random objects including a princess, a bird, a cat, and a squid in their black shape. Dave, though he was surrounded by them, seemed to be handling it nicely killing each imp with one stroke of his sword. The blue gusher-like objects fell from the imps and Dave picked them all up as he passed over them. 

            “Don’t stand there,” Dave demanded. “Attack! For Narnia!”

            Leo didn’t hesitate but he started to set the imps on fire and they started to burn. Nico summoned his dead warriors to help thin out the armies of imps and I brought out my knife to stab the imps. All it took was one stab or swipe to kill them. Some of the imps dropped blue gushers, purple gushers, or black drops. When I stepped over them, they disappeared to gods know where.

            It was an easy battle to say the least with only one swipe needed to kill an imp. By the time we were done, Jason, Piper, Frank and Hazel came up to join us.

            “Welcome to the party, you’re late,” Leo stated.

            “What were you fighting?” Frank asked trying to pick up one of the blue gushers but when his hand passed over it, the blue gusher disappeared. 

            “Imps,” I answered. “Or that’s what Dave called them.”

            “What took you so long anyway?” Leo asked.

            “We actually wanted to get dressed for battle this time,” Piper explained. “What’s Dave looking for?”

            Dave, though the battle over, still seemed to be on edge. He was walking around, gathering all the blue gushers as he walked over them, and looking around as if there was supposed to be more. Finally, he stopped and stated. 

            “Ogre,” Dave said. 

            “Ogre?” Jason asked as Dave ran up to the front of the boat.

            “On the sides,” Dave repeated.

            “What do you mean on the-oh,” Leo looked over the side of the boat and was met with a large black hand grasping onto the edge of the Argo 2. A large black figure wearing jester’s clothes pulled itself onto the Argo 2. It had two large horns extending from its mouth and started to try and wreck havoc.

            Dave didn’t waste a minute while the rest of us where forced back into shock. Dave pulled out a shitty sword and jumped up in the air. He jabbed it in the stomach of the ogre before launching off to the mast of the ship. He cut a rope and used it to swing around and landed on the ogre’s face. He slashed his sword across the ogre’s eyes blinding it. He swung around the tusks wrapping up the rope in between them. Dave leapt off the ogre onto the mast and watched as the blind ogre tried to struggle free.

            Leo came to his sense first, “Are you trying to destroy my ship Strider!?” Leo demanded from Dave as he watched the ogre struggled. He knew that the monster could rip the mast off his ship but Dave, from his perch, just gave Leo a smirk.

            At the moment where the ogre looked like it was about to destroy the Argo 2 by ripping off the mast, Dave cut the rope and the ogre stumbled backwards off the Argo 2 plummeting to the ground. 

            “One down, three to go,” Dave stated as two more ogres hoisted themselves onto the deck and one struggling to climb up. “Teen Titans Go!”

            Dave cut another rope and swung around the ship as we all began to get ready to fight. Jason launched himself off the ground with the wind and settled on one ogre to attack. Frank turned into an eagle to fly up to meet one of the ogre’s head on before turning into a bear and starting to maul the face off an ogre. Nico summoned his armies of the dead, and Leo started to shoot bolts of fire at the ogres. That left, Hazel, Piper and I left to attack on the ground, which would mean that we would just be stabbing feet. Thought that has worked in the past, I don’t think that it would work here.

            “Dave!” I called out for him as he swung around on his rope entertaining his ogre. “What are we supposed to do?”

            “Fight the imps!” Dave answered. As if on cue, more imps started to pour over the decks and onto the Argo 2. To say, Hazel, Piper and I were occupied. 

            “Where are they coming from?” Hazel asked as Dave killed his ogre by pushing it off the ship again after chopping off one of its legs and jumping off its chest.

            “They’re spawning in,” Dave answered as he jumped on the ground killing multiple imps in one stroke. 

            “Like in a video game?” Leo asked helping Jason killed one of the last two ogres with a combination of fire and lightning. The ogre exploded into a pile of the blue gushers, purple gushers, and black drops. 

            “Yeah,” Dave answered.

            “What are they dropping?” Jason asked after being showered in the gushers.

            “Grist,” Dave answered. “Sburb’s equivalent of money.” 

            “What do you use it for?” Piper asked killing another imp.

            “I forget,” Dave modestly answered.

            Frank jumped off his ogre as a frog and turned back into a human on the ground. “Anyone want to help me with ogre?”

            “Got it,” Dave answered shimming back up the rope and gaining momentum by swinging around like he was on a rope swing. He finally gained enough momentum as he swung around to launch off the rope and land on the ogre square in the chest. He then pushed off the ogre grabbing back onto the rope. The ogre started to tip and Frank helped Dave. He turned into an elephant and ran into the ogre causing it to fall over. I killed the last imp and the battle was over. Maybe.

            “Anymore imps?” Nico asked. “Or ogres?”

            “Not for now,” Dave answered. 

            “We’re almost there,” Leo announced looking over his equipment. “Though, now my deck is covered with grist.”

            “I’ll pick it up,” Dave offered and just walked around the deck making the grist disappear. 

            “What now?” Hazel asked Dave as we neared 21605 Fir Drive, Maple Valley, Washington. 

            Dave paused and turned to me, “We try and get some of my memories back.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry if this didn't quench your thirst for action. Not that I'm sure if any of you readers had any in the first place. I'm not the best at writing fighting scenes in my own eyes but you may think differently. Though, I think Dave swinging around on the rope makes up for it. Just think about it in context: Dave swinging around on a rope like a total hero as ogres attack from all sides. Perfection.
> 
> Next chapter: Jason tells the story about how Dave remembered his friend John, they perform the crime of breaking and entering and Dave doesn't give a shit, and a Narnia reference.


	13. Jason: The Harlequin, The Toilet, and The Wardrobe

            Dave instructed Leo to land the ship right in the middle of the street in front of 21605 Fir Drive, Maple Valley, Washington. Dave wanted to make this stop short and sweet so Leo did as Dave instructed.

            Dave jumped off of the Argo 2 and stared right at the cookie cutter house that was called 21605 Fir Drive, Maple Valley, Washington. There was nothing odd about it, for it looked like every other house on this street. Other than the fact that there was a toilet right next to the mailbox.

            “What are you looking for?” Annabeth asked Dave.

            Dave was silent, lost in the thought.

            “Why is there a toilet there?” Leo asked looking at the toilet.

            “Maybe they’re throwing it out?” Piper guessed.

            “I bet I can name more name for a toilet than any of you can,” Leo betted. “There’s the potty, john, the porcelain throne-”

            “Repeat the second one,” Dave instructed Leo.

            “What? Toilet names?” Leo asked.

            “Yes,” Dave answered, not tearing his eyes away from the house.

            “John,” Leo answered.

            Dave was silent again before stating, “This house belonged to John Egbert, one of my best friends. He basically started the game of Sburb. By accident of course. He’s a really loveable dork. He plays pranks, the piano, and is obsessed with Nick Cage. Well, not anymore. He used to be. I bought him the bunny from Con Air for his thirteenth birthday. He turned out to be a pretty awesome fighter in the end.”

            “Anything else?” Annabeth asked Dave.

            Dave was silent before stating, “Nothing that needs to be said out loud.”

            Everyone was just silent as they stared at Dave, who was staring at the house.

            “Is anyone even living in the house?” I asked.

            Everyone was silent again before Dave stated, “Let’s check it out.”

            Dave walked down the drive-way before everyone was following after him. Mostly because he was about to perform the act of breaking and entering, not because we wanted to see what was inside the house. 

            “Dave! This is breaking and entering!” Annabeth warned Dave.

            “Not if the door is unlocked,” Dave stated as he walked up to the front door. He tried to twist the door knob but it was locked. “Shit, it is locked. I just guessed that it wouldn’t be locked. Well then, I guess we’re breaking and entering.”

            “But this is against the law,” Hazel argued.

            “Just see if I care,” Dave laughed. “I bet that I don’t even exist on this Earth.”

            “What if they have an alarm system?” Frank asked.

            “They don’t,” Dave answered.  “Now, let’s bust down this door.”

            Dave kicked the door opened and walked inside the dark house, the only light coming in through the window. He turned on the light to reveal a quaint living room with a staircase leading upstairs and two doorways, one to a kitchen and another to a study. A roaring fire blazed on in the fireplace, though it was the middle of summer, making the room uncomfortably hot. There was a variety of jester statues on shelves to the point that it was almost creepy.

            “This looks just like the pictures John sent me,” Dave said walking into the house. “Creepy harlequins in all.”

            “You mean jesters,” I argued.

            “Harlequins,” Dave replied. He then began to sniff the air, “Can you smell that?”

            “No,” Frank replied before turning into a bloodhound. He sniffed the air then turned back into a human, “It’s a Betty Crocker cake cooking.”

            Dave scowled, “Fucking Betty Crocker.”

            He left the room and went through a pair of saloon-like doors and came back out seconds later with a freshly baked Betty Crocker cake, fully frosted and looking amazing.

            “Cake!” Leo exclaimed and walked over to Dave to get some, but it was too late. Dave threw the cake into the fire and watched it burn with no emotion. Leo and Frank both seemed traumatized that Dave wasted a perfectly good cake.

            “What was that for?” Leo demanded.

            “Fuck the Batterwitch!” Dave proclaimed.

            “Who’s the Batterwitch?” Piper asked.

            “I dunno,” Dave replied. “Hey, where did Annabeth go?”

            “Upstairs!” Annabeth called. Dave then went up the stairs and everyone followed. He went down the hallway and found Annabeth in a gray bedroom. The bedroom itself seemed to glorify pipes, ties, shaving, and manliness.

            “Who’s that douche?” Dave asked pointing to the large black and white picture of a man smoking a pipe hung above the bed.

            “Bing Crosby,” Annabeth replied. “He was the one who first sang Irvin Berlin’s White Christmas in the movie Holiday Inn.”

            “I thought he sang it in White Christmas?” Leo asked.

            “No, Holiday Inn inspired two more Irving Berlin movies: White Christmas and Easter Parade. Bing Crosby was in White Christmas, Fred Astaire and Judy Garland in Easter Parade.”

            “Fred Astaire, he’s the guy with the pointy face?” Dave asked.

            “Yes,” Annabeth replied.

            “And wasn’t Judy Garland in Wizard of Oz?” Piper then asked.

            “Yes,” Annabeth answered.

            “So why are you looking through Mr. Egbert’s things?” Dave asked leaning over Annabeth’s shoulder.

            “Just curious,” Annabeth replied sifting through Mr. Egbert’s nightstand.

            “Why does this guy have a throw rug with the outline of a fedora printed on it?” Leo asked stepping around the rug.

            “Because Mr. Egbert had mangrit,” Dave tried to explain. “And bitches dig mangrit.”

            As Hazel cringed, Annabeth turned around to slap Dave upside the head.

            “I do not think I deserved that,” Dave informed Annabeth.

            “Let’s just go and check out the other room,” Annabeth sighed and walked out of the room. Everyone followed her as she went to the other bedroom. Inside the other bedroom was a shrine to horrible movies. Con Air, Ghost Busters II, Face Off, Ghost Dad, John had them all. The only creepy thing was that there were scribbles of jesters and insulting phrases written on the wall above the bed.

            “Ah yes, the holy shrine of Egbutt,” Dave exclaimed as he entered the bedroom. “Shitty movies, multiple cakes, stupid magic tricks. Ah, John was one of a kind.”

            “Why did he write on the walls?” Hazel asked looking at what was written above the bed.

            “I . . . have no explanation for that,” Dave replied observing the drawings.

            As Annabeth tried to get onto John’s computer, and Dave went over there to insult his friend’s skills in computers, I left the room to walk back into the hot living room. I was going to search around some more without Dave. I started by walking over to the door right across from the hallway and opening it up. It led to a balcony with a strange piece of white machinery on it.

            The white machinery was one of the strangest things I’d ever seen. It had a large white platform with multiple controls surrounding it. A large robot arm with a strange piece of black machinery attached to the end stood up at the side. There was a smaller platform right underneath it.

            “Whoa,” Dave’s voice came from behind it. It seemed like Dave had followed me out here. “You found an Alchemiter.”

            “A what?” I asked as Dave walked up to it.

            “An Alchemiter,” Dave repeated. “Oh, just think of the sweet shit we can make with this! But that means, that there must be the other machinery around here somewhere! Let’s go!”

            Dave grabbed my hand and dragged me down the stairs into the study which had two other strange pieces of machinery.

            “Look! A Totem Lathe! And a Punch Designix! If we find a Cruxtruder then we can make anything, and everything!” Dave exclaimed.

            “What is this stuff even for?” I asked Dave.

            “Okay,” Dave began. “Say you take this hat,” Dave grabbed a fedora off of the hat stand. “And this harlequin,” Dave grabbed a jester off of the piano. “And you captchalogue them,” the hat and the jester disappeared from Dave’s hands. “Then, you take the cards,” two yellow cards with the hat and the fedora on them appeared in Dave’s hands. “And you put them into the Punch Designix. You get a Cruxite Dowel, which the Cruxtruder makes, and put it into the Totem Lathe. According to the design the two punch cards place on top of each other make, the Totem Lathe will carve the Cruxite Dowel to make a Cruxite totem. You take the Cruxite totem to the Alchemiter, and the Alchemiter will make an amalgam of the fedora and jester that you can actually wear and use.”

            “That’s complicated,” I commented.

            “It is,” Dave agreed. “But awesome. We’ll get Leo to put this stuff on the ship so we can use it, and make awesome weapons and things.”

            I didn’t say anything but followed Dave back out into living room where there was now another white piece of machinery that wasn’t there before. It was large, bulky, and had a main cylinder inside it.

            “Are we all very, very ignorant of our surroundings or did that just appeared while we inside the study?” Dave asked me.

            “It certainly wasn’t there before,” I commented, because it was smack in the center of the room.

            “Well, now we have our Cruxtruder,” Dave finished up. “Let’s get everyone to load this sick gear up on the Argo 2.”

            “Wait,” I paused Dave. The lid on the main cylinder of the Cruxtruder was moving. We both watched it as it flew off and an explosion of confetti bursted out of it. Dave, the living room, and I were completely covered with small, colorful pieces of paper.

            “EGBERT!” Dave yelled angrily.

            “Wait,” I stopped Dave again. A small piece of paper peacefully blew out of the Cruxtruder as if it was being guided by a gentle breeze right into my hands.

            “Oh mighty Jason,” Dave faked bowed. “You have been chosen by the Goblet of Fire. May the odds be forever in your favor.”

            The front of the paper was blank so I flipped it over and revealed an address, “It’s an address.”

            “The almighty paper must be guiding us to our next destination,” Dave ripped the piece of paper out of my hand. He looked it over before turning it again because it was upside down. He then stated, “Yep, it’s definitely an address.”

            “You must be a genius or something,” I sighed as Dave stated the obvious.

            “IQ of 167. Higher than Albert Einstein, Bill Gates, and Stephen Hawking. I just play dumb,” Dave retorted as he studied the address. “Seems familiar. It’s in New York.”

            “Meaning we have to fly all the way back to the other side of the country!” I exclaimed thinking that we were just over there.

            “Rainbow Falls in New York,” Dave said out loud. “It’s in Adirondack State Park.”

            “Who do you know that?” I argued.

            “I just told you my IQ level,” Dave retorted.

            “What’s going on?” Hazel asked as she came down the stairs. “And what is that?”

            “Cruxtruder,” Dave and I said at the same time.

            “We need to load that along with Alchemiter, the Totem Lathe, and the Punch Designix onto the Argo 2 so we can make cool shit,” Dave explained.

            “Why are you two covered in confetti?” Leo asked, as he came down the stairs right behind Hazel and Frank.

            “Egbert,” Dave answered.

            “I thought you said he might not exist in this universe,” Frank informed Dave.

            “His pranking spirit still lives in this very house,” Dave answered.

            “And we got our next destination,” I added taking back the piece of paper from Dave. “Rainbow Falls in New York.”

            “But we were just over there,” Hazel pointed out.

            “The paper dictates it,” Dave argued snatching the paper back. “See?” Dave handed Hazel the paper and she looked over it.

            “Where did you get the paper?” Hazel asked.

            “Cruxtruder,” Dave and I said at the same time again.

            “I’m not even going to ask,” Annabeth sighed as she came downstairs with Piper.

            “I will,” Piper added. “What-”

            “John,” Dave and I said at the same time for the third time. “Cruxtruder.”

            “So what do you have there?” Dave asked Annabeth who was carrying a hard drive.

            “I downloaded everything on your friend’s computer,” Annabeth replied. “So we can look over it to see if there is anything that could help us.”

            “Good,” Dave agreed. “John always said that he had some furry porn he downloaded on accident. I’ve always wanted to see if he was bluffing or not.”

            “What’s-?” Hazel was about to ask.

            “Don’t ask,” Frank stopped her.

            “So where are we headed to?” Piper asked.

            “After we get all of the sweet gear out of this house,” Dave instructed. “We’re going back to New York. Rainbow Falls.”

            “Another cross-country trip,” Annabeth groaned.

            “But you know what they say: New York, New York, it’s a wonderful town. The Bronx is up and the Battery’s down. The people ride in a hole in the ground. New York, New York, it’s a wonderful town.”

            “Quoting musicals? Really Dave?” Annabeth asked Dave.

            “Nothing is below me,” Dave stated.

            “And we’re headed to Rainbow Falls,” I added. “Not New York.”

            “As I said, nothing is below me,” Dave restated. “Now, let’s get moving!”

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think I explain the process of the alchemizing things correctly. 
> 
> But what could be happening between Dave and Jason? Is it something . . . black?


	14. Jason: A Poem by Dave Strider

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a short chapter I added in just because.

            We spent the rest of the day trying to get all of the machinery out of the Egbert house and onto the Argo 2. It was a pain for me, because I had to use the wind to lift the Alchemiter off of the balcony and onto the ground. Then, Dave directed everyone on how to get the machinery out of the house, and didn’t bother to lift a finger. Gods, I really hate him.

            So later that night, we took off and I was able to go to sleep. However, in the middle of the night the emergency bell rang and everyone was summoned to the top deck. We were half-dressed for battle and everyone was surprised when it turned out to just be Dave.

            “Why’d you wake us up?” Leo demanded.

            “I wrote a poem,” Dave declared.

            “That’s what you called them up here for?” Annabeth asked Dave, who was on shift with him. “I thought you had made some important battle plan or you had some important news or something you remembered!”

            “This is important,” Dave argued. “Now, sit down. And when I’m done, you have to snap because snapping is cooler than clapping.”

            “Why?” I asked. “Just why?”

            “I’m your captain, and I say sit your ass down so you can hear my cooler than ice poem,” Dave ordered me. I just sighed and sat down on the deck with everyone else. “Okay, so this poem is called Swiggity-Swag.”

            “Oh no,” I groaned.

            “Hey Jason, shut up or I’m sending you to Davy Jones’ Locker,” Dave threatened me.     

            “Davy Jones’s locker?” I questioned.

            “Yes,” Dave started. “Here he comes now to claim your soul for his dirty gym locker filled with sweat socks in his ship the Flying Dutchman. As he flies through the sky in his ghost ship with his crew of monkeys, you can hear his death march play. It goes like this: ‘Cheer up, Sleepy Jean, oh what can it mean, to a daydream believer and a homecoming queen. You once thought of me, as a white knight on a steed-’”

            “You can stop now Dave,” Annabeth informed Dave.

            “Not a really good death march,” Frank commented.

            “It’s an allusion to Davy Jones’ of the Monkees,” Annabeth explained to Frank. “His name is the same as the Davy Jones of the actually pirate myth. ‘Daydream Believer’ is one of Davy Jones’ signature songs.”

            “Oh,” Frank then shut up and turned back to Dave.

            “Are going to read the poem or not?” Piper asked Dave. “I want to go back to bed.”

            “Okay, here I go,” Dave cleared his throat then began.

 

“Swiggity swag, what’s in the bag?

Said the hag with the rag

To that douchey nag

 

“Swiggity-swat, watcha getting at?

Said the cat and the bat

To the no good damn awful rat

 

“Swiggity-swick, airwick

Said the chick watchin da flick

With her hot boyfriend Mick

 

“Swiggity-swock, what’s up doc?

Said the clock going tock

To the barber wearing da smock

 

“Swiggity swass, do she have a ass?

Said the bass to Lewis Cass

Who was loaded with sass

 

“Swiggity-swuck, what the fuck?

Said the duck in the truck

Selling drugs to Chuck

 

“Swiggity-swack, where’s the shack?

Said Mack with the crooked back

To the crybaby Jack

 

“Swiggity-swime, just in time

To hear a rhyme for a dime

As the clock goes chime

 

“Swiggity-swow, oh no

He lost the show as it started to snow

And then he ran over the female doe.”

 

            Then Dave had finished and he took a bow but no one was snapping or anything.

            “Well,” I stated. “That’s five minutes of my life I will never get back.”

 


	15. Jason: Dave Looses His Sanity (And His Taste Buds)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Okay, so Dave is pestering someone in this chapter, and I don't know how to get the text colors so just imagine that some of the stuff is whited out.
> 
> Also, when I began to write this chapter, I didn't expect for it to head in the direction that it headed in, but I'm happy with it.

            All we got from the mansion in Rainbow Falls was that it was the home of Dave’s twin sister, Rose (and apparently he got a rose on his pillow from someone and he dismissed it as a name but it was a name), and the address to an apartment in Texas. We faced imps, Giclops, basilisks, and other strange creatures as we flew across the country on a crazy road trip, but it was tamer compared to what we had seen before.

            “So this is the apartment building?” Hazel asked Dave as they floated through the Houston skyline.

            “Yeah,” Dave replied, looking at the address he found tucked in a book called ‘Complacency of the Learned’, which Dave insisted that he bring with him. When Annabeth asked him about the book later, he said that he was disappointed because it had no wizard porn. Hazel was in the room at the time, so she had to leave out of self-embarrassment.

            “How are we going to get in?” Frank asked Dave.

            “Jason, fly over and open the right window,” Dave instructed me.

            “How do I know which one is the right window?” I replied.

            “Someone won’t be screaming at you. That’s how you know in the movies,” Dave answered.

            “Fine,” I sighed, having to put with Dave’s shit for so long. I floated along windows, just glancing in to see if someone was in there. After a few windows, I found the one, “Guys, I found it.”

            “How do you know?” Piper asked me.

            “It’s filled with smuppets,” I answered.

            “What?” Dave asked.

            “Yeah,” I turned around to face him. Dave quickly climbed up the mast, grabbed onto a rope, and swung towards the window, shattering it as he broke through.

            “I have a board we could’ve used a bridge,” Leo informed Dave from the Argo 2.

            “Let’s just go over,” Annabeth sighed, not trying to challenge Dave’s shit.

            I climbed through the window, careful not to cut myself on broken glass, to see Dave standing in the middle of the living room, looking around.

            It certainly looked like Dave’s home. It reflected his personality. Messy, dangerous, and stupid. As everyone filed in behind me, (minus Nico who decided to stay on the ship), Dave began to regain his memories.

            “Bro would sleep here,” Dave began pointing to the couch. “And the computer was his work station. I would play on his Xbox when he wasn’t home,” Dave visibly became excited, actually showing emotion. “And the kitchen! Swords in fridge, puppets in the sink, everything exactly how I remembered it! I lost all my taste buds right there! And over there, I got drenched in plush rump! Wow, it’s all the same!”

            “You lost your what?” Leo asked.

            “You got drenched in _what_?” Hazel asked.

            “Puppet butt,” Dave cleared up. “And through here is my room! Wow, it’s all the same!”

            Dave ran through a hallway and went into a very messy room which was probably his own. He began to quickly go through his things, acting like it had been forever since he had stepped inside his room. Dave almost smiled because it was apparent he was so happy to be back. He flopped on his bed and stared up at the ceiling.

            “Wow,” Dave said. “I’m back.”

            “We have to find the next address,” Annabeth said, as she had already picked up on the pattern.

            “Hey, can’t a guy enjoy the peace and quiet of his room on his own?” Dave asked, sitting up, noticing that everyone had crowded around the door. “Unless anyone wants to join me on the bed?”

            “Ew,” Annabeth replied.

            “What’s that on your computer screen?” Piper noticed at the flashing box on Dave’s computer screen.

            “Pesterchum,” Dave answered as he went over to the computer. “Come gather round children, someone happens to be pestering me.”

            “Who? I don’t see anything on the screen,” Hazel stated as she came over to the Dave’s computer desk.

            “Hhm,” Dave though. He then highlighted the first line, which showed text, “Mr. Vanilla Milkshake, or whatever you are. You thought you could be crafty, but you aren’t.”

            “What does it say?” Leo asked, stuck behind everyone.

            No one complied. We were all watching Dave’s conversation.

 

Doc Scratch began pestering turntechGodhead [TG] at 1:46

 

Hello David.

TG: thats not my real name

TG: you pestered rose and uh whatshername

TG: not the girl from the green day musical

TG: but the other one

Terezi? Yes, and I also communicated with Kanaya and Vriska, you friend John’s patron troll.

TG: why are you talking to me

TG: actually i shouldnt be talking to you

TG: you did bad things to rose

TG: i dont remember what but i swear you did

Now, now Dave, no need to be so harsh. I’m here to help you.

TG: how could you help me

I know where you need to go and how to get there.

TG: tell me

You didn’t want my help a second ago.

TG: changed my mind

TG: fork over the info or else i start the four hour rap fest

Alright, the next place you need to go is Jade’s island.

TG: jade

TG: yeah i kinda remember her

But it is not like it was when Jade lived there.

It is more like when Jake lived there, covered with wildlife found on Alternia, the Lusi.

TG: so dangerous

But once there you will be able to enter the Medium.

Do you remember how to get there?

TG: uh

TG: you gotta hatch an egg

Close, but no cigar.

It’s the same process to make the egg.

And it will be like the last time.

TG: why are you helping us

TG: how will this help you

It is not your concern.

However, you may want to look behind you.

My father has found a host

TG: look what

TG: wait you have a father

 

Doc Scratch ceased pestering turntechGodhead [TG] at 1:58

 

            Suddenly, I felt something watching me. I turned around two see two soulless glass eyes stare at me, but suddenly they were gone.

            “Did anyone else see that?” I asked.

            “What?” Piper asked.

            “Soulless glass eyes,” I replied.

            “I just saw something with red cheeks,” Frank said.

            “And I saw something with a blue shirt that said ‘Cal’,” Hazel stated.

            “Oh no,” Dave suddenly stood up, ramming the deck chair into my legs.

            “Do you know what it is?” Annabeth asked as something blue and orange moved around in the background.

            “Lil Cal,” Dave whispered. “But Bro was his puppeteer. Who could be moving him?”

            “Ghosts?” Leo suggested. “You know, like those things that took over me, Percy and Jason back when we were trying to defeat Gaea.”

            “You mean the eidolon?” Annabeth asked.

            “Am I going to have to perform another exorcism?” Piper asked.

            “What?” Dave got distracted. “You performed an exorcism before? Was it like from Supernatural? Did you meet Sam and Dean?”

            “Dave! Pay attention,” Annabeth told Dave. “Who is Lil Cal?”

            “The creepiest puppet in the world. I used to think that he was cool but then it turned out that he was a vessel for the biggest bad guy or something like that,” Dave answered.

            “Like Jack Noir?” Piper asked.

            “No, worse,” Dave explained. “I had nightmares of him talking to me. I woke up in a cold sweat.”

            “HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO,” a loud chilling laughter echoed through the room. It sounded like someone was strangling a clown that sounded like a goofy kid’s show host.

            “There he is,” Dave flinched, showing that he was actually scared of the puppet.

            “HOO HOO HAA HAA HEE HEE,” the laughter continued to come from everywhere and nowhere. “YOU ALL OVER COMPLICATE THINGS. JUST SIT BACK AND LAUGH. HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA.”

            “What the fuck!?” Dave nearly jumped out of his skin, and he jumped into Annabeth’s arms. Annabeth suddenly dropped him, so Dave crawled under his desk like a scared cat.

            “It’s a puppet,” I protested.

            “WHAT’S A MATTER DAVEY? DID YOU FORGET ALL THE FUN TIMES WE HAD?  HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!” the laughter came from underneath the desk.

            “AHHHHH!” Dave let out a shrill girly scream and jolted out from under the desk. The blue and orange blur flew out from under the desk to the other side of the room. Sitting on Dave’ turntables was a creepy puppet. It had a gray face, red lips, a gold tooth, soulless blue glass eyes, orange corduroy arms and legs, and a blue shirt with his name on it. It looked like a puppet you would find in a house of horrors, but I didn’t expect it to do anything.

            “AND TO ANSWER YOUR FRIENDS QUESTION DAVEY,” Cal’s mouth moved, and his arm moved to rest on his chin like he was relaxing. “I’M NOT JUST A PUPPET ANYMORE. HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO! A GHOST TRIED TO POSSESS ME BUT I DROVE IT CRAZY! HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!”

            “You drove an eidolon crazy!?” Annabeth asked, now realizing the power of the puppet.

            Lil Cal moved again in a blur to Annabeth shoulder where he curled around her arm like an octopus and stuck his face in her face, “HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO! YES I DID MISSY. AND NOW I CAN TALK AND MOVE! AND I WASN’T JUST A PUPPET BEFORE. I WAS A JUJU.”

            “Get off me,” Annabeth growled and Lil Cal flew over to Dave’s bed.

            “Juju?” Hazel asked. “My mom used to have jujus. They never did anything.”

            “WELL THEN YOUR MOM WAS A STUPID IDIOT AND PROBABLY DIDN’T KNOW WHO TO USE IT CORRECTLY. HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!” Lil Cal jumped over to Hazel and landed on her head.

            “Leave us alone!” I pulled out my sword, sick of this puppet’s shit since Dave was too scared to move. At the moment, Dave was curled up in the feeble position on the floor, scared out of his wits. I couldn’t blame him sadly; his worst nightmare had come true. So since he couldn’t do anything, I had to take charge.

            “WHOA, WHOA, WHOA!” Lil Cal came over to me and curled up on my back like a backpack. “HOLD UP THERE MISTER HUNKY PANTS! HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO! I WAS TRYING TO ANSWER YOUR QUESTION!”

            “I didn’t ask a question!” I protested trying to get a stab at the puppet, but it was too fast for me.

            “DON’T EVEN TRY MISTER HUNKY PANTS!” Lil Cal reappeared in Dave’s closet, sticking his head and arms out, waving them like tentacles. “HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO! I BEAT DAVE UP ON A REGULAR BASIS! YOU CAN’T BEAT ME!”

            Everyone looked to Dave for answers, but he was sucking his thumb.

            “Fight me like a man instead of hiding like a whimp!” I tried to challenge the puppet.

            “BUT I’M NOT A MAN! HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!” Cal answered. “I’M A JUJU! I HAVE NO ORIGIN! THERE IS ONLY ONE OF ME AND I CANNOT BE DESTROYED! I MUST ALWAYS HAVE AN OWNER AND MY OWNER IS DAVEY!”

            Everyone looked back to Dave, who was still sucking his thumb.

            “I don’t think he wants you man,” Leo informed the puppet.

            “DAVEY WAS MY OWNER ONCE!” Lil Cal declared, leaving the closet to curl up next to Dave like a dog. “BUT HE TRAVELED BACK IN TIME TO CREATE ANOTHER UNIVERSE WHERE HE WAS HIS OWN GUIDE AND NOT I! OH, WOE IS ME! HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!”

            “I’ll be your master,” I told the puppet, trying to make progress. I could at least make progress by sending the puppet away.

            “YOU CAN ONLY BE MY OWNER IF YOU KILL MY ORIGINAL OWNER OR IF DAVEY WILLINGLY GIVES ME TO YOU. BUT DAVEY WON’T GIVE ME AWAY BECAUSE HE LOVES ME, RIGHT DAVEY? HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!” Lil Cal curled tighter next to Dave making a disgusting scene. Dave was still sucking his thumb and was curled up in a ball while Lil Cal was wriggling as he curled up next to Dave, brushing his hands softly on Dave’s face.

            “Take him Jason!” Dave pulled the thumb out of his mouth. “Take the puppet! You’re his owner! Go away Cal!”

            “ALRIGHT! HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!” Cal then appeared back on my back. He wrapped around my arms, and repeated the same motion of slowly brushing his hands on my face.

            “Cal, how did you get here?” Annabeth asked the puppet, taking the time Call was bouncing around the room to analyze the situation.

            “MY SON SENT ME HERE! HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!” the puppet cackled. “HE WANTED ME TO GUIDE YOU OR SOMETHING! TO MAKE UP FOR THE TIME I WASN’T ABLE TO GUIDE POOR, POOR DAVEY CURLED UP THERE ON THE FLOOR! HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!”

            “You’re going to guide us to Jade’s island?” Piper asked, recalling the pesterlog.

            “YEP! HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!” Cal laughed.

            “Shut the fuck up Cal,” I sighed, getting tired of the laughing.

            “ALRIGHT,” Cal became quiet, but continued to rub my face.

            “So I guess we should get going,” Frank said out loud, now that they had a guide.

            “Right, I’ll get the ship ready!” Leo ran off, seemingly happy to be out of the same room as Cal.

            “I’ll come help,” Frank followed Leo, and Hazel joined them.

            “I’m sorry Jason, that puppet’s just too creepy,” Piper apologized and left the room, leaving behind Dave, Annabeth and I.

            “I’m sorry that we have to leave so soon,” Annabeth told Dave, and I realized that Dave would actually be sad to leave. He was so happy to be back, but it was ruined by the arrival of Cal, and now he had to leave straight away.

            “It’s alright,” Dave said as he stood up. He didn’t look to me because I had the bane of his childhood on his back, but looked to some pictures that were knocked over. Dave bent down to pick them up. When he stood up, Dave began to shuffle through the pictures and began to sniffle.

            “What’s the matter?” Annabeth asked.

            Dave looked up to show that tears freely fell from his eyes.

“I’ve done his before,” Dave stated. “Cried from these pictures. It was when I realized that I had lost my childhood. I took all of these ironic selfies but when I last looked at them . . . I had lost the passion of photography. I lost something from my childhood. And I lost a whole lot more. I lost my home. I lost Bro. I lost my taste buds . . . actually, I lost those when I was four, but still. I was a different person. And it hurt to realize that.”

Dave removed his sunglasses to wipe away the tears, showing the freckles on his cheek bones. He opened his eyes to face both me and Annabeth, showing us that his eyes weren’t blue like mine and like everyone probably thought, but red. He put his sunglasses back on and pocketed the photos.

            “Let’s go. Crying over spilled milk isn’t going to solve our problems with Jack Noir,” Dave declared. He turned towards the door, and didn’t set his eyes on me, “Keep that demon away from me.”

Dave and Annabeth left the room, and I wondered what I was going to do with the little urchin on my back.

            “YOUR SKIN IS SO SOFT MISTER HUNKY PANTS. HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!” Lil Cal declared once Dave and Annabeth left.

            “Shut up you creepy piece of shit and don’t call me Mister-ulrhgh,” I tried to reply but Lil Cal stuck his hand in my mouth.

            “YOUR MOUTH IS GROSS. YOU SHOULD BRUSH MORE. HAA HAA HEE HEE HOO HOO!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So Cal's here now. As I said in the beginning, I wasn't originally heading for Jason to own him, but I had an idea in the middle of writing the chapter that just evolved when I read up on Jujus on the MSPA Wiki. Let's watch this unfold.
> 
> Also, Lil Cal being a little shit and touching his Owner's faces was inspired by the SNL cold opening when they were making fun of the Sound of Music and Denise. Just so you know.


	16. Dave: Where The Wild Things Are

            The ocean seemed to stretch for miles, blending in with the blue sky at the horizon. The sky looked like a painting, the depths of the clouds seemed unrealistic, but yet it was still tempting to try and reach out to one as though you were a little kid.

            But enough about me trying to come up with prose for raps. I was trying to get a look out for Jade’s/whatshisname’s (whoever the devilfuck that kid was) island. I was worried about what Doc Scratch told us, and especially now that he sent Lil Cal, who was still wrapped around Jason’s back wriggling like a worm. Sometimes, I swore that Lil Cal would be looking at me with his soulless eyes, but when I turned around to look, he was still rubbing Jason’s face like a little freak.

            Annabeth had been busy with looking through John’s computer so I couldn’t talk to her. Hazel and Frank were too pure, Leo was busy doing his tech thing and admiring the tech we got from John’s house from afar because I wouldn’t let him touch it and Piper was usually talking to Jason who had Lil Cal, so I was hanging out with Nico to his delight.

            “Do you see any land?” I asked Nico from the crow’s nest. He seemed annoyed that I was regularly coming up there with him because I was bored.

            “No,” Nico sighed. “Will you stop asking that?”

            “No,” I replied. “Anyway, so what do you do for fun?”

            “Nothing,” Nico replied.

            “So, you sulk,” I answered.

            “No,” Nico argued.

            “Yes.”

            “No.”

            “Yes.”

            “No.”

            “Yes,” I replied. “And this isn’t an argument! I paid for an argument! You’re just being contradictory!”

            “What?” Nico asked.

            “I’ll show you it later,” I informed him and I turned my eyes back on the horizon. “Hey Jason! Are you sure that that demon on your back is giving us the right directions?”

            “What else can we do?” Jason replied.

            “HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!” Lil Cal cackled. I shivered. That laugh would haunt me for the rest of my life.

            “What’s that?” Nico asked, pointing over to the left. “The white thing flying in the sky?”

            “A seagull,” I guessed,

            “We’re in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, I don’t think there would be any seagulls,” Nico argued.

            “Well there are a lot of small islands,” I reminded Nico.

            “Let’s go that way,” I suggested. “Yo Leo! Left!”

            “Left?” Leo asked.

            “Right!” I agreed.

            “Right?” Leo asked.

            “No, left!” I argued.

            “So left?”

            “Right!”

            “Right?”

            “No, left!”

            “Dave!” Nico stopped me. “You know you’re doing that on purpose.”

            “Left!” I yelled again.

            “Left?” Leo asked.

            “Yes!” I replied for the last time.

            “Left!” Leo shouted, and the boat lurched left. “Why are we going left?”

            “To check out some seagulls!” I answered.

            “Why?” Leo replied.

            “Dinner!” I shouted.

            We flew closer to the white object in the distance, and we were also able to spot a lush green island.

            “Land!” Nico shouted.

            “THAT’S IT! HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!” Lil Cal laughed.

            “Cool, now we’ll just have to figure out how to get to Derse,” I said leaning back on the railing.

            “Still, that white thing,” Nico said, Wait, where did it go?” The white thing had disappeared from the skyline.

            “I dunno,” I answered.

Suddenly, we meet the white thing. It sprang out from underneath our flying boat and flew over us.

            “Is that a-?” Leo tried to ask.

            “DRAGON? HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA! YES IT IS!” Lil Cal answered.“Thank-you, Lil Cal,” I whispered under my breath.

            “Dragon?” Frank asked as he, Hazel and Annabeth joined everyone on deck. “Whoa! It is a dragon!”

            “Hey! Animorph!” I shouted at Frank from below us. “Can’t you like, turn into a dragon and talk to it?”

            “It doesn’t seem to be harming us!” Annabeth replied. Annabeth was right, if anything, the dragon looked happy, flying around the Argo 2 as though it was its new playmate. It sniffed the sides of the boat energetically, and it reminded me of someone.

I looked back over to the island, and watched it as it grew closer. It was a lush green, with large frog ruins taking up most of a lake. More white animals dominated the lands, but they were just white specks in the distance.

            “This isn’t like any Drakon I’ve ever seen,” Annabeth commented as the dragon floated next to the Argo 2, to get a chance to sniff the inhabitants. It was like a dog, sniffing Frank’s ass as though it wanted to get to know him.

            “Ah!” Frank jumped up in the air as the dragon got a little more . . . aggressive in its sniffing. I found it hilarious.

            “THAT’S BECAUSE THESE ARE LUSI!” Lil Cal exclaimed. “THE CARETAKERS OF AN ALIEN SPECIES CALLED TROLLS! HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!”

            “They inhabit the island?” Piper asked Lil Cal.

            “YIPERONI!” Lil Cal answered. “THOUGH THEY’RE NOT ALL AS FRIENDLY AS THE DRAGON HERE! HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA! I’D WATCH OUT FOR THE SEAGOAT LUSI!”

            “Where is he?” Jason asked.

            “HERE! HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!”

            I looked over the side and quickly jumped off the crow’s nest, “Seagoat!”

            “What?” Annabeth asked as the maul of a rabid goat loomed over the side of the ship, jumping up to try and grab someone. It was terrifying; it was like a rabid mer-goat. It had a row of sharp teeth, and two horns spiraled up from his head. His hooves were about the size of a golf cart and his jaw could crush an RV. It would be nice if he wanted to be friends like the dragon, but he obviously wasn’t.

            “My gods!” Leo exclaimed when he saw it.

            Everyone pulled out their weapons, but the dragon obviously wasn’t happy that this guy was trying to make food out of her new friends. It attacked the mer-goat the next time it dared stick its head out of the water. Anyone would stand down against a dragon if they were right in the head, but the mer-goat wasn’t so it attacked as well.

            “Let’s get away!” Jason shouted. “As the dragon’s distracting it!”

            “No!” I argued. “We have to help the dragon!”

            “What? Dave, are you crazy!?” Piper asked me.

            “Maybe, not proven yet,” I argued. “I don’t know why, but that dragon reminds me of a friend, and we aren’t going to just let it takes blows for us without us giving it something in return!”

            “Fine,” Annabeth agreed with me for some reason. “What should be doing?”

            “Frank, turn into a dragon,” I turned to Frank.

            “Why me?” Frank protested.

            “Because you can turn into a dragon,” I informed Frank. “And two dragons are better than one.”

            “Fine,” Frank sighed. He suddenly turned into a Chinese Dragon and joined in the fight. It was definitely an easier fight with two dragons in the mix, Frank’s golden, red, and green scales adding color to the fight as well. It was strange to watch the fight, because I wasn’t apart of it, the dragon bled teal blood, and the mer-goat bled purple blood. Finally, after gaining enough injuries, the mer-goat sulked off.

            Frank returned to the deck, and got another aggressive sniffing from the dragon as thanks for joining in the fight.

            “That was . . . interesting,” Frank said as he sat down, the dragon still sniffing him, but had moved onto his head.

            “The dragon likes you,” I informed Frank as it happily sniffed his head.

            “Why is it sniffing you?” Annabeth asked about the nature of the dragon.

            “I dunno,” Frank answered.

            “It’s blind,” I said. “It can smell and taste colors, using its other senses to see.”

            “How do you know that?” Hazel asked me.

            “I . . . think I had a friend like that,” I replied.

            “You have strange friends,” Annabeth informed me.

            “And you don’t? You all are strange,” I argued.

            “HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!” Cal seemed to back that up as he stroked Jason’s face and neck.

            “True,” Jason agreed. “Let’s just land on the island and figure out what we’re supposed to do.”

            “Let’s go! I’m getting cabin fever!” I shouted.

            “That does not mean that we’re going to do a wacky song and dance number, Dave,” Annabeth informed me.

            “Fuck! How’d you know?” I asked her.

            “You brother had pictures of the Muppet Babies in your apartment, and cabin fever was a part of Muppet Treasure Island,” Annabeth explained.

            “Okay Sherlock,” I huffed a reply as we landed on a beach of the island between two poles that were apart of a frog temple.

            “Now what?” Hazel asked.

            “I think I have the answer,” Leo interjected before I could say anything. “Last night, the top of Cruxtruder returned, so I think we need to remove it.”

            “I don’t have a good feeling about this,” I quickly said so my thoughts could be heard.

            “Do we have any other leads? And you said that the machinery was important,” Annabeth reminded me.

            “Alright, let’s go look,” I shrugged and went along with it.

            “Do you have anything to say about it?” Jason asked Lil Cal.

            “NOPE. HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!” Lil Cal answered.

            Everyone went down to the lower level of the Argo 2, which was filled with machinery from the game. Everyone was silent as Frank pulled the wheel the opened the lid. Suddenly, the cap came off and a cylindrical sea-green object fell out. A timer appeared on the Cruxtruder starting at four hours, and slowly ticked down. That’s when my memory hit me.

            “Shit,” I began. “Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!”

            “What?” Nico asked me, trying to get me to stop repeating a vulgar word.

            “I just remembered something,” I exclaimed.

            “Is it important?” Leo asked me.

            “‘Is is important?’” I repeated mockingly. “The timer is counting down to something bad. We have to get into the Medium before it goes off!”

            “What’s in the Medium?” Hazel asked me.

            “No idea,” I answered. “But we have to take this Cruxite to the Totem Lathe to get carved, and then take it to the Alchemiter to make something we have to break to get into the Medium!”

            “How do we carve it?” Annabeth asked, picking up the Cruxite.

            “We need the card!” I panicked. “But I have no idea where it is! It’s supposed to be the Pre-Punched Card we get at the beginning of the game!”

            “Maybe it’s on the island,” Frank suggested. “It could be in the place with the frog in the lake.”

            “I thought I saw the bottom part of a tower on a mountain when we were flying in,” Piper added.

            “I think whathisname’s house is somewhere around here too,” I finished up, getting my head back. “Okay, so we’ll split up. Frank and Hazel, go to the Frog Temple. Jason, Leo and Piper, you’ll go to the broken tower, Annabeth, Nico and I will try to find whathisname’s house. The card should look one of my captchalogue cards, but with multiple rectangular holes in it. Everyone good?”

            Everyone agreed so I continued on, “Alright, watch out for Lusi.”

            “Any last words Cal?” Jason asked the puppet on his back.

            “HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA! NOPE! JUST WATCH OUT FOR ANIMALS MILKING IN THE SKY! HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!” Cal answered.

            “Everyone try to get back here within three hours,” I finished up, ignoring Cal’s warning. “So we can spend the last hour trying to figure out what to do if we can’t find the card. Avengers Assemble!”

            Annabeth, Nico and I headed off into the forest, in a separate direction from everyone else. I felt as though I was India Jones, hacking through the tough undergrowth with my sword. I could hear Lusi scrounging through the undergrowth around us, but they were drowned out by Annabeth’s questioning throughout the entire trip.

            “So what bad thing will happen?” Annabeth got to the important question at last after questioning me with strange questions for an hour.

            “No idea. Maybe a meteor apocalypse. It could be that volcano going off. A bad guy could be arriving. Global stock markets could crash. A nuclear war could start. Snoop Dogg could die. Something really bad,” I explained as I tripped on a pumpkin.

            “Did I just trip on a pumpkin?” I asked Annabeth and Nico.

            “What pumpkin?” Nico asked me. When I turned around, there was no pumpkin, but a vine.

            “Huh, strange,” I stood up and dusted myself off. I looked up to find a field of pumpkins surrounding a small tower with a large sphere at the top. I looked as though the tower had been there for centuries, and resembled a cue ball.

            “Is that the house?” Annabeth asked me.

            “I guess so? I mean, I don’t remember anything and this is the only thing we’ve seen for hours,” I answered.

            “Let’s go,” Nico began to walk forward.

            “I think we should pick some pumpkins,” I stated, not moving from my spot. “You know, we can make Jack o’ Lanterns in the Medium.”

            “Dave,” Annabeth sighed.

            “Look at that!” Nico exclaimed randomly, not paying attention to the important pumpkin conversation, and instead pointing to a spot above our heads. We all turned around to face a giant crab-like lusus, towering over us, and snapping its claws like it was hungry.

            I don’t know why, but I suddenly felt like I was a Lusi Whisperer, and I felt like I needed to do something incredibly stupid. Like the dragon, the crab reminded me of a friend and I didn’t want to fight it. Another one of my memories unlocked and I was about to put it to use. Hopefully, it would work. If it didn’t, I’ll go out like Steve Irwin.

            I took a step towards the crab lusus.

            “Dave!” Annabeth yelled at me. “Pull out your sword!”

            I didn’t. I knew what I had to do.

            “SCREEEEE!” I shouted as I got in a crab-walk position and snapped my hands like claws. “SCREEEE!”

            “Huh?” Annabeth asked.

            “He’s lost it,” Nico answered.

            The crab lusus looked confused, but then it yelled back, “SCREEEEE!”

            “SCREEEEE!” I answered, continuing to do the crab walk.

            “SCREEEEEE!” the crab lusus answered, lowering its head so we were face-to-face. Annabeth and Nico continued to look at me though I was off my rocker; but they were shocked that it was working.

            Now that the crab-lusus was level with my, I slowly placed my hand on his head and sooshed him. I continued the motion of slightly patting his head accompanied by a sooshing sound. Eventually, the crab-lusus fell on the ground and went to sleep.

            “I am the crab whisperer!” I proclaimed in a whisper afterwards, not wanting to wake the crab lusus up.

            “How?” Annabeth asked me in a whisper.

            “No idea, let’s just go inside,” I whispered back, and we all headed for the house.

            We went inside the house and followed the staircase up to the single room. The room was horrorific, covered with posters of action movies (some not necessarily good) and posters of blue women. Comics and guns scattered the room, and the only two pieces of furniture were a bed and a table.

            “Man,” I looked around the room. “Who ever lived here must’ve had a lonely existence. I mean, the guy has only two pieces of furniture. Yeah, the comics are cool, but how did he see all these movies? And why does he have so many guns?”

            “Let’s just look for the card,” Annabeth discouraged me from traveling further into this guy’s life by looking at just his room.

            “And he does have the Lusi outside,” Nico reminded me.

            “Yeah but, not all the Lusi are friendly, he must have been fighting for his life everyday,” I answered as I picked up a comic book. Just as I did, a card fell out of the book and onto the floor. The punched holes made the shape of a trident, and the outline of the card was a sea-green color. “Found it.”

            “Let’s get back!” Annabeth picked the card off the floor and ran out of the room with Nico. I stayed for a moment, trying to remember who lived in the room so he could at least have a name, but I couldn’t so I ran out after my friends.

            Outside, there were still pumpkins everywhere and the Crab Lusus was asleep. I caught up to Nic and Annabeth, who had stopped in the middle of the field.

            “What’s up?” I asked, and noticed that a tiny fairy-like lusus with bull horns rested on a pumpkin in front of them. “Why aren’t you going? It’s like a pixie.”

            “It could be like that rabbit from Monty Python and the Holy Grail,” Annabeth informed me.

            “I didn’t take you for a Monty Python fan Annabeth,” I informed Annabeth.

            “I’m not, Percy made me watch it,” Annabeth argued.

            “Well, kill it if you think that it’s a rabid beast,” I told her. Nico pulled out a gun and shot it in the head. Brown blood splattered the pumpkin. ‘Where did you get the gun?”

            “I grabbed it from the inside,” Nico answered. “I wanted back-up in case our weapons won’t work on Jack Noir.”

            “I’m not sure a gun will help either,” I sighed, and I regained another memory. “You just killed a Tinkerbull!”

            “What’s that?” Nico answered.

            “Probably the most peaceful Lusi ever,” I answered.

            “Well, it’s just one,” Nico argued. “They’re probably like flies.”

            “They aren’t like flies,” Annabeth answered.

            “How do you know?” I asked her, which I should stop because she knows everything.

            “They’re more like wasps,” Annabeth pointed to a swarm of Tinkerbulls flying above our heads.

            “Run,” I suggested, and we all took off in the direction of the Argo 2.

            Now, Tinkerbulls aren’t deadly. They’re harmless. But their horns hurt, like being stung without the swelling. That’s what it felt to feel the wrath of a swarm of Tinkerbulls.

            We got back to the Argo 2 and headed down to the bottom level, where I began to work. I didn’t talk as I shaped the Cruxite dowel into a totem and then took it over to the Alchemiter where it turned into some type of discus launcher. A shield sat in the launcher, ready to be shot.

            “Now what?” Nico asked.

            “We should wait until everyone gets back to launch it, or else we’ll get sucked into the Medium without everyone,” I suggested.

            “And we need Jason, he’s apart of the prophecy,” Annabeth added.

            So we sat around until the rest of the team returned. At exactly an hour left, both teams returned to the Argo 2 at the same time.

            “What were those things?” Hazel asked as she and Frank came below deck to the food court. “The bull-fairies.”

            “They hurt,” Frank complained.

            “Tinkerbulls,” Nico answered. “We accidentally angered them.”

            Jason, Leo and Piper then all came below deck. They were all soaking wet, excluding Cal, due to his satanic magic.

            “What happened to you guys?” Frank asked as the second group returned.

            “We got milked on,” Leo huffed.

            “What?” Annabeth asked.

            “Giant centaurs with handlebar mustaches,” Piper explained. “They milked on us. Be happy they didn’t shit on us, because we could see them doing that too.”

            “Did anyone find the card?” Hazel asked.

            “We did,” I answered. “Everything’s set up downstairs. We just need to break the artifact.”

            “Let’s do it!” Leo answered, not bothered that he got milked on anymore, and ran downstairs.

            “This is weird,” I told Annabeth as everyone went down to the Cruxite artifact. “Usually it’s broken at the last minute. We have an hour.”

            “Don’t jinx it,” Annabeth informed me and we all went downstairs.

            “So how do you launch it?” Leo asked.

            “Cut the string,” I answered as I pulled out my sword.

            “Is it a good idea to launch it down here?” Frank asked me.

            “We just need to break it,” I assured him. “Here goes nothing.”

            I chopped the string holding back the launcher with my sword. The shield didn’t break on impact. It cut through the Argo 2 into the sky. Through the hole it made, I could see that it grew until it implanted itself into the sky.

            “Uh,” Jason began. “What happened?”

            “SILLY DEMIGODS!” Cal interjected. “AND _DAVEY_. YOU NEED TO BREAK THE SHIELD BY RAMMING YOUR FLYING SHIP INTO IT! HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!”

            “What!” Leo panicked. “This is not good. The shield cut through some machinery! We may not be able to take off!”

            “Work on it!” I yelled as Leo. He pulled some shit out of his magic tool belt and got straight to work. “We only have an hour.”

            “See?” Annabeth replied. “You jinx us.”

            “Whatever,” I sighed. “This is a test. It’s symbolic. Somehow. I don’t know how. But it’s symbolic. So we have to wait.”

            Everyone went upstairs but me. I sat next to the Cruxtruder, watching the timer slowly tick down.

            Time was my thing. I had an infinite amount of it. I decided to take the time to go back and stop myself from continuing on to intensely rap about my feelings. I wrote a new rap based on what I had seen from the crow’s nest. I played solitaire. I checked the stock markets. All in one hour.

            There was five minutes to go when Leo shook me back to reality.

            “I think I got it!” Leo informed me excitedly, his face and clothes covered with soot, grease and oil.

            I ran up behind and everyone piled up on the deck.

            “So are we just supposed to ram into the shield?” Hazel asked, uncertain about the plan.

            “YES!” Cal answered. “HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!”

            “Stop that,” Jason hissed at the puppet.

            “Full speeds ahead Captain Strider?” Leo asked me, taking the dire moment to put in a joke.

            “Full speeds ahead,” I repeated, not taking my eyes off the shield. I was counting down the time in my head, and I knew exactly the amount of time we have left, “Four minutes, thirty-seven seconds.”

            “Huh?” Annabeth asked me, hearing what I had said.

            “The time we have left,” I replied. The horizon seemed clear of impending meteors, large warships, or nuclear missiles. The volcano seemed tame, and Snoop Dogg was in good health. I didn’t know what could go wrong, “Four minutes, five seconds.”

            “We have liftoff!” Leo shouted as the Argo 2 began to float. “Everything seems to be okay!”

            “Three minutes, fifty-one seconds.”

            The shield loomed in the sky, high above us, like a Stargate. The sea-green color blocked out the sun, leaving us in its shadow, but it wasn’t that big. It was far away, so it looked like one of those multi-colored circles you would use in gym class to bounce balls on and play games with.

            “Three minutes, twenty-nine seconds.”

            “Thrusters on!” Leo shouted, ready to ram his pride in joy into the shield at full force. “Set to maximum! I hope you’re right Dave!”

            “Two minutes, forty-four seconds.”

            The shield came closer. It was now the size of a one-ring circus.

            “One minute, nine seconds.”

            “Stop that count down, we’re going to make it,” Annabeth told me, but I could her the nervousness in her voice, for she was also unsure of what would happen if we didn’t make it through the shield in time.

            “Twenty seconds.”

            The shield could accommodate every aspect of the Argo 2, from the mass to the oars on the side.

            “Ten.”

            “We’re gonna make it!” Leo shouted.

            “Nine.”

            “May the gods let us make it,” Jason prayed.

            “Eight.”

            “Can we really break it?” Frank asked.

            “Seven.”

            “That count-down is ominous,” Piper commented.

            “Six.”

            “What’s on the other side?” Hazel asked.

            “Five.”

            “The Medium,” Nico answered.

            “Four.”

            “Dave, you should really stop that,” Annabeth insulted me.

            “Three.”

            “HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!”

            “Two.”

            We touched the shield with the tip of the Argo 2.

            “One.”

            The shield shattered.

           

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm really proud with the cliff hanger. I'm even more proud that you get to suffer through the cliff hanger because I won't be able to post next week. BWAHAHAHA!


	17. Annabeth: We Get a Costume Change

            “One.”

            I closed my eyes as the shield shattered before us. I thought it was going to be a painful process but when I opened my eyes, the blue sky had changed into a planet, with a blue background to swirling white clouds. I was surrounded by blackness, with a golden planet with a chained moon floated off to our right. Above us was a belt of meteors, and a purple planet, similar to the golden one.

            The scenery wasn’t the only thing that changed. Everyone had made a costume change. We were all wearing pajamas: Leo, Jason, and Frank were all wearing golden silk pajamas; Piper, Nico, Hazel and I were all wearing purple silk pajamas. Dave was wearing red pajamas with a cape and hood, but his sunglasses remained. Lil Cal was also still with us, but his blue shirt had been swapped out for a purple one.

            “Why are we wearing these?” Frank asked Dave. “Why did you get a cape while we got these?”

            “Because I’m god tier,” Dave answered. “You and the others aren’t.”

            I then noticed that Dave was floating, not high above us, but high enough that it was easy to notice the difference in height.

            “Dave, you’re floating,” I informed Dave.

            Dave looked down, “Well, so I am. Okay, moving on. You have more questions about your clothing selection but I think you should all be happy and thankful that you are wearing clothes and not running around in your birthday suits.”

            “But why is that a difference in color?” Piper asked, ignoring Dave’s last comment.

            “Because,” Dave answered. “Jason, Frank and Leo are Prospit Dreamers. Nico, Hazel, Piper, Annabeth and I are Derse Dreamers.”

            “You aren’t making any sense,” I informed Dave.

            “Have you ever fallen asleep and woke up in a different world? A dream world of either purple or gold, as your Dreamself?” Dave asked. “This is that world.”

            “No sense,” I repeated.

            “Well then deal with it,” Dave stuck his tongue out at me. “You guys are all party-poopers then.”

            “If this made sense-which it doesn’t,” Jason began. “Then why are we a certain ‘dreamer’?”

            “CAN I ANSWER THAT? HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!” Cal reminded everyone that he was still here.

            “I thought you’d been lost on earth,” Jason sighed.

            “NOPE. HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!” Cal cackled.

            “No,” Dave sighed. “So here we go. Prospit dreamers were born heroes and proved themselves as fighters. On the other hand, we have Derse Dreamers, who were born fighters, but proven heroes. Got it?”

            “No,” everyone said at the same time.

            “I UNDERSTAND DAVEY!” Cal answered.

            “So this is the Medium?” Hazel asked Dave.

            “Yep,” Dave floated higher. “It’s all apart of the Incipisphere. See over there, that’s Skaia. And the golden planet? Prospit. The meteor belt is called the Veil, and the purple planet beyond that is Derse. Beyond Derse, in the void, is the Furthest Ring. Don’t listen to anyone who comes from there.”

            “Why?” Leo asked.

            “They’re called Horrorterrors, first off,” Dave began, which explained everything. “And then we also have eight other planets, LOWAS, LOLAR, LOHAC, LOFAF, LOCAH, LOPAN, LOTAK, and LOMAX. Those are all acronyms, land of x and y, if you will.”

            “So now what?” Nico asked.

            “What did the poem Rachel give me say?” Dave asked me.

            “‘The Knight of Time travels with wisdom and storm, a quest for the White Queen’s Ring they must perform, watch out for the Hound of Derse is back, the feared servant of the Black Queen, Jack’,” I repeated. “And you have all our information on this subject.”

            “Uhm, well,” Dave began to think. “Jack already has the Black Queen’s ring, but he wants the White Queen’s ring. The White Queen’s on Prospit, Black Queen’s on Derse. White moves first in chess.”

            “What does chess have to anything?” I asked Dave.

            “Symbolizes,” Dave answered.

            “DERSE AND PROSIT REPRESENT THE SIDES ON A CHESS BOARD. PROSPIT-WHITE, DERSE-BLACK,” Cal explained while Dave was in thought. “HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!”

            “Wow, you were actually useful,” Leo commented.

            “SAY THAT TO MY FACE!” Cal turned to Leo creepily before laughing. “HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!”

            Leo took a couple steps back.

            “Don’t threaten people,” Jason commanded Lil Cal.

            “OKAY,” Cal answered, sounding hurt.

            “We head to Derse,” Dave decided.

            “But you said that the ring’s on Prospit,” Annabeth asked.

            “And you said that it gave the holder powers,” Piper interjected, remembering what Dave said at the campfire.

            “Not to humans,” Dave answered. “It does shit nothing to humans.”

            “Then why are we going to Derse?” Jason asked.

            “White moves first. We’re playing for white,” Dave answered. “We go to Derse to see if Jack’s there. If not, we retreat to find and protect the ring.”

            “But wouldn’t it be dangerous? Walking into enemy territory? If you said that Derse is black, and Jack’s on Derse, then won’t they be evil?” Hazel asked. “We wouldn’t be safe anywhere.”

            “Like two sides of a coin,” Leo suggested. “Like Gotham and Metropolis.”

            “No,” Dave answered. “A lot of the carapaces are good guys. One of them was a pawn, and he’s one of my best friends, and is the greatest guy in the universe. Not all Dersites are bad, I mean, look at the five of us, dressed up in purple PJs. We’re Gotham’s Bat Family. There are still good guys left in Gotham, so there are still good guys left on Derse.”

            “If you’re the Bat Family,” Leo began. “Does that make you Batman and Jack Noir Joker?”

            “Sure,” Dave agreed. “Get to the helm Leo, we’re headed to Derse!”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next Chapter: Dicking Around on Derse!


	18. Dave: Dicking Around on Derse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! Heads up! I'm going to add this as an actual warning in the story, but I actually described some gory stuff. I personally don't think it's as graphic as it could be, but I could be wrong. So warning to those who don't like stuff like that or are triggered by blood, death and such. It doesn't actually happen though, for Dave it's just flashbacks, and the rest are just statues. If you read it and think that yeah, it's pretty gory, tell me. I will add the warning anyway, but I am just curious.
> 
> Also, please read what I have at the end. It deals with why I don't update frequently, my thoughts on Blood of Olympus, and how that will affect the story.

                The Incipisphere . . . the final frontier, these are the voyages of the starship Argo II, to boldly go where no man has gone be-

                I’m just kidding. I’m pretty sure we’ve been all over the Incipisphere during the game. Well at least I think. I know for a fact that the one place most of us (minus Rose) hadn’t even thought about looking to was the Furthest Ring, mainly because you would have to be thoroughly insane to go there.

                Moving on though. You could describe Derse in one word: purple. So much fucking purple. 50 shades of it almost . . . but probably closer to 49.

                “Hey,” I floated above Leo. “I got a wifi signal.”

                “Do you want to attract monsters?” Annabeth scolded me.

                “There aren’t any monsters,” I replied. “Aside from Jack.”

                “So can I land on Derse?” Leo asked as we got closer.

                “No need to, we’ll just float down ourselves, leave the Argo II flying above it like a looming spaceship-even though it isn’t a really impressive flying boat. I’ve seen bigger,” I rambled.

                “Hey!” Leo objected. “I’ll have you know that the Argo II will be able to beat any of the supposedly bigger fancy-schmany spaceships you can pull out of your ass!”

                “Leo!” Annabeth got ready to scold Leo for swearing.

                “Hey, I’ve been doing a good job keeping my mouth shut this past year! Dave showed up and suddenly it was swear-central so I don’t see why I can’t use one every once and a while,” Leo argued.

                “You go Leo. Fight the fucking power,” I added.

                Annabeth sighed, “Wait Dave, what was this thing with flying down?”

                “We can fly,” I answered.

                “We can?” Leo questioned.

                “Yeah,” I laid down in the air, floating on my back. “It’s not just a Jason thing anymore.”

                “How?” Annabeth asked.

                “You just gotta burp Charlie.”

                “Oh no,” Annabeth sighed. “Pop culture references.”

                “No really,” Leo tried, “How do we fly?”

                “Pixie dust and happy thoughts.”

                “Dave,” Annabeth sighed.

                “Click your heels three time and say ‘I want to go home’.”

                “You’re running out,” Annabeth realized.

                “Follow the yellow brick road.”

                “Dave. Stop.”

                “Don’t get your Peter Pants in a twist.”

                “That isn’t a pop culture reference.”

                “Don’t stop believing.”

                “Dave!”

                “You’ve never seen the grand canyon.”

                “Dave!”

                “Green is not a creative color.”

                “DAVE!”

                “Are we close enough to Derse?” Leo asked.

                “Yeah,” I finally replied much to Annabeth’s relief. “Let’s bounce.”

                “Should we wake everyone else up?” Leo asked.

                “Nah,” I set my feet on the ground and grabbed a sticky note off of Leo’s command center. I scribbled a quick note in red pen before smacking it onto the wheel. “Let’s just go, just the three of us.”

                “I really don’t think that’s wise,” Annabeth pointed out.

                “I left a note,” I pointed to the sticky note on the wheel.

                “It says ‘We left you suckers to go down to Derse. See you fuckers whenever. Signed, turntechGodhead’,” Leo read out loud.

                “So?” I replied. “Let’s just go.”

                “Fine, teach us how to fly,” Annabeth replied.  
                “You kinda,” I tried to explain. “I dunno, will yourself to float.”

                “Will yourself?” Annabeth repeated.

                “Yeah,” I replied. “Watch.”

                With that, I jumped over the edge of the ship.

                I’ve always wanted to skydive. It seemed cool to have the wind rush along your face while you could possibly plummet to your death. However I could fly, and even if I die I doubt it would be heroic or honorable so I would just come back.

                I’m not sure how that works though. Game mechanics I guess?

                I flipped around at the last second and stopped abruptly by floating. I then stepped down on the ground and watched Leo descend. He had jumped off the side like me. I could hear him scream as he fell.

                “DAVE HOW DO I FUCKING FLY!” Leo screamed.

                “Believe in yourself!” I yelled back.

                “FUCK YOUUUUUUU!” Leo replied. I sighed and flew up a bit. As he fell, I grabbed him by his gold, silk pant leg and stopped his fall.

                “Thanks,” Leo sighed as I placed him down on the ground.

                “Okay Annabeth your turn! You jump and I’ll catch you! Cause I’m a knight and everything! You can trust me!” I shouted up. That’s when the end of a rope hit me in the face. I was knocked back onto the purple sidewalk and my shades flew off my face. Annabeth scurried down the rope and Leo handed me my shades.

                “Here dude,” Leo handed them back.

                “Thanks,” I took them and slid them back on as Annabeth joined us. “You didn’t jump.”

                “I wasn’t risking my life,” Annabeth argued.

                “Yeah but these are our dream selves. We’re dreaming, we can’t get hurt or die,” Leo argued.

                “What?” I asked. “Of course you can die.”

                “But, you’re dreaming,” Leo tried to argue. “You know, you never actual die in dreams.”

                “You can die here,” I explained. “I was in my dream self when I became god tier because my actual self had died. And to become god tier, you have to die.”

                “So do you remember how you died?” Annabeth asked.

                “No, I just remember what Mr. D told me, that I had to die to become a god, and since I am a god I must have died,” I replied.

                “Uhm, did I not get the memo?” Leo asked. “Mr. D told you this?”

                “Yeah, here’s a quick recap of what Mr. D told me but I never told you or anyone else only Chiron and Annabeth,” I answered. “See, the game Sburb is the ultimate game, you become a god, and you get the ultimate prize: to become gods of a universe. Your gods played this game, because they were once normal people in a normal universe. Well, normal for them. They’re aliens. But whatever. Okay let’s move we have to find Jack.”

                “I’m still confused,” Leo replied.

                “Well Mr. D didn’t tell me everything,” I argued as I began to walk through the empty purple streets.  “Maybe we’ll find some answers here.”

                “Didn’t you say that there were Dersites?” Leo asked me.

                “Yeah, but we probably scared them all away with your giant battleship,” I replied.

                “Didn’t you say you’ve seen bigger fancy-schmany spaceships?” Leo objected.

                “Yeah, but yours is brown. It’s not purple or gold so it’s actually a UFO,” I argued. “And not all of the Dersites have gone home. There’s that guy.”

                Above us, on the purple brick street, was a little Dersite scrambling around on the street. He seemed like an excitable little fellow, even if he looked like he was squashed. To be honest, he looked cute scrunched up like that and dressed up in work attire.

                He quickly approached us, arms waving and legs kicking frantically. From my past experiences with Carapaces (which I know I have but do not remember), I’m pretty sure he didn’t seem scared of us. He seemed more excited than scared.

                “Uhm, is this normal behavior?” Annabeth asked me.

                “The fuck if I know,” I shrugged as I got down to eye level with the little guy. “Hey, do you work for the Black Queen?”

                “Will he understand you?” Leo asked.

                “Once again, the fuck if I know,” I shrugged, but then I turned back to the little guy and repeated the question. “Do you work for the Black Queen?”

                He nodded his head quickly, excited to answer.

                “Cool, do you know Jack Noir?” I then asked. He nodded with the same gusto as before. “Do you know where he is?”

                This time, he shook his head.

                “Can you find out where he is for us?” I requested.

                He nodded his head and then took off the way he came, as fast as his little legs could take him. I decided that we should take him with us, because he was cool. I mean he was cool, but not as cool as the Mayor. No one could fill the Mayor’s place in my heart. Whoever the mMayor is. I begun to think about the little Dersite and decided he needed a name though. As I tried to come up with one, Annabeth rudely interrupted me.

                “Are you really going to put all our faith into him?” she questioned.

                “Yeah,” I turned around to answer before whipping my head back around to the street. “Oo, what’s that?”

                Leo and Annabeth had to reluctantly follow me to something that looked like a tourist trap. A big glowing purple sign with spinning doodads surrounding it to catch the eyes of people who like shiny things. Apparently, I am one of those people.

                “Hall of Dreamers,” Annabeth read out loud.

                “Thanks Annabeth, I couldn’t read,” I retorted and Annabeth glared at me.

                “We should move along,” Annabeth decided. “I really don’t think that little Dersite will actually get any answers.”

                “He works for the Black Queen, so let’s wait for him,” I argued. “And while we wait for him, we can hang out in here.”

                “Wouldn’t that be bad to place our trust in someone who works for the Black Queen? Because they could then give us away? I mean, I do kinda stand out with my gold PJs and we are also human,” Leo argued.

                “Leo has a point,” Annabeth agreed.

                “I wanna see if I have a statue,” I revealed. “Let’s go in.”

                I entered the hall and Leo and Annabeth stepped in behind me. Surprisingly, it was purple. Statues of people of various alien species lined the sides of the hall. The statues were dressed in regal god tier robes, so I don’t think the sculpture got the memo that god tier clothes are basically pajamas.  Behind each tall statue carved into the purple stone wall was the person’s aspect, because it would stain Derse if it had colors other than purple in it.

                “Cool,” I said as I strolled further in. Annabeth and Leo were a bit more apprehensive about the whole hall for some reason I didn’t seem to notice.

                “Look at the plaques,” Annabeth became a bit more adventurous and headed straight for the information. The statue Annabeth was looking at looking at had four arms and looked a bit like an ant-eater, but that didn’t stop her from reading the plaque. “‘Graft Slater, Mage of Blood. They wait for he, who looks through blood to teach others from blood.’”

                “These statues are kinda gory,” Leo pointed out. “Like, where are their pupils? Is that supposed to be blood? Does that one have a sword sticking out of their stomach?”

                I have no idea how I didn’t notice, but what Leo said was true. Each statue depicted a gory death, or probably multiple deaths, because there was that one with seven sword sticking out of their stomach. Each statue lacked pupils, reflecting the state of a ghost in a dream bubble. The detail went deeper than the frills on the robes in each statue, it showed the blood pouring found the wounds and staining the clothes. It was quiet impressive, though now the whole room looked like an episode of _Dumbest Ways to Die_.

                “I think Hades would like this place,” Leo concluded, taking in another sweep of the room.

                “And here he is,” I added.

                “What?” Annabeth asked as she and Leo joined me by my side. Standing in front of us was the statue of a guy named Hades Olympian. He was a Doom player, and he seemed to have the most unfortunate amount of luck when it came to deaths after he achieved god tier.

                I counted six swords in his chest, the outline of blood sketched into the rock. Blood poured out of his mouth and his empty, pleading eyes looked up. The worst of it was that there was a sword straight through the middle of his forehead, and his head was even indented a little around the impalement. Whoever made these had an eye for detail.

                Annabeth probably began to read the plaque but I zoned out. I looked into Hades’s pleading eyes, and to the indent in his head, and cracking of the skull behind the stone skin. My eyes trailed down to his chest, the handles of the swords protruding, and tempting to grab and to try and pull out.

I could see it clearly in my mind eyes this poor fellow begging for his life, on his knees. Red blood glistening in the sunlight as it streamed down his dark green shirt. His head, looking up and brown eyes pleading for another moment to live, fighting to stay alive for one moment. But the attacker didn’t give up. The skull cracked as the sword slide through his brains and poking out at the other end. The doom player fell on the ground, motionless, dead, blood staining the checkerboard ground.

                Another image flickered. A middle-aged man looking as though he was in his 20’s, lying on the ground. His gray baseball hat had fallen off his disheveled spikey hair, and his pointy anime shades askew revealing orange, lifeless eyes that showed no fear, not even at the last moment. He wore a white shirt that was now red, stained by the blood that was pouring out of the hole in his chest. The murder weapon, a sword stuck up as clear as day, the part of the blade that was no covered in blood glistened. The ground beneath the man had cracked, and the sword was unmovable, pinning him to the ground. Blood had filled the cracks. The man was dead and could not be moved.

                The scene changed. My sword was loose in my hand, and beneath me was a dead girl, her eyes closed but she was still beautiful. Long black hair and soft cheeks, but her face lacked a smile that should have been there. I felt a breathtaking pain in my chest and I gasped for air as though I was drowning. I coughed and blood filled my mouth, toppling over and dribbling down my chin. I looked down and saw the handle of one sword, and the red blade of another. Everything began to go dark, but gold symbol flashed before my eyes and I could hear the word ‘heroic’ whisper through my brain.

                “‘They waited for he who would live a thousand deaths and die not of one’,” Annabeth read and I was brought back to reality, but I still felt as though there was blood in my lounges so I spun into a cough fit, surprising both Annabeth and Leo.

                “Dude, are you okay?” Leo checked as I got ahold of myself. I was alive and well, no blood where it wasn’t supposed to be, like in my lungs.

                “Yeah, I got something in my throat,” I lied. Annabeth didn’t seem too sure about that.

                “It sounded more like you were drowning,” Annabeth argued.

                “I can over react,” I lied again.

                Annabeth squinted but then turned back to the statue, “So . . . this is definitely Hades. It looks just like him.”

                “You know, if he was teenager,” Leo added.

                “You did say that the gods played their own game, right Dave?” Annabeth checked. “Like the game you apparently played.”

                “Yeah,” I replied. “They had their own planet once, called Olympia. They just happened to be of the royal family of Olympia, the players of the first session, AKA the Big Six.”

                “So are you saying that the gods are aliens?” Leo asked.

                “Yeah, like that one Star Trek episode with Apollo as an alien,” I explained. “I think I mentioned this before we entered the hall.”

                “And you kept this from us before because . . . ?” Annabeth asked.

                “Well Mr. D said something about not wanting their image of being gods to be ruined, but once again I don’t like being mysterious,” I explained. “So Mr. D basically said that their species kinda relied on others to live. Their spirit needed to be fuel by belief. Everyone believed in everyone on their planet so that worked out, but on earth, the belief of three other people didn’t help. So the gods portrayed themselves as badasses and people believed in them. They changed when people’s ideas and beliefs changed, and actually making them into new people. Over time, their congregation kinda fell but they have just enough with the Greek and Roman populations to keep going. They don’t tell you because they don’t want to lose that faith.”

                “And why did Mr. D tell you that?” Annabeth asked. “When did he tell you that?”

                “Well it was before our quest. He asked to talk to me and he told me a little bit about their game and their old home planet. Basically because he wanted to get it off his chest and have some fresh blood to relate to,” I guessed. “I mean, I’ve heard all of the other gods are assholes and with a game like Sburb, no wonder why he drinks.”

                “Let’s see who else is here,” Annabeth stated and we continued on down the hall.

                “Look there’s Zeus,” Leo pointed out. “But why is he a Derse dreamer and not a Prospit dreamer like Jason?”

                “Different sessions I guess. Not everything has to be the same,” I replied. “Actually, I don’t even know why you guys have dreamers. No one downloaded the game.”

                Annabeth walked over to Zeus’s plaque and read it, “‘Zeus Olympian, the Prince of Breath. They wait for he who can break apart the sky then rule over the ruins.’ Yeah, that’s Zeus.”

                “And the others here are Athena, Aphrodite, Ares, Demeter, and Artemis,” Leo pointed out. I didn’t really care about the gods so I moved down to the trolls. I didn’t know most of them personally (the one with the braids I think I was acquainted with more than one time), so I guessed most of the ones I knew were over on Prospit. Hopefully, Prospit had a cheesy tourist trap like this so I could see some of my friends.

                “And then we also have a bunch of other people,” Leo commented, trailing me. “I wouldn’t want to be that guy.”

                Leo was pointing to a statue of a troll who happened to have been separated at the waist. As with all of the other trolls, he seemed oddly familiar, but for some reason I thought he was a greaser. No wait, that’s the guy across from him with the obtrusive dick.

                “He looks like a douche,” I commented and carried on to the part I wanted to see: me.

                At the very back were four humans. Me, my sister, a guy who looked like the dude from the one memory flash I had a few moment later, and a fourth person who looked like my mom.

                My statue would have been pretty cool if it didn’t look as though I was riddled with bullet holes and those two swords from my flashback earlier were impaled through my chest. I was looking up to the sky and I held a sword in my left hand loosely. As I looked back to the stone swords through my statue, fear raced through my body as adrenaline kicked up, I felt as though my lungs were filling with blood again and I couldn’t breathe. To stop myself, I looked away to my sister’s statue.

                That wasn’t much better. She was crying, looking as though she had just lost someone she loved. There was a large hole in her stomach and blood splattered across her dress. I’m really glad that there weren’t in color and that I couldn’t remember her death. I wouldn’t want to remember her death since I was about to have a panic attack over my own.

                The guy who looked the guy from my flash didn’t looked like he died. He was looking down, sword held loosely in his hand. However, someone had taken the effort in the statue to make it looked as though it was glitching out. It was almost as if in his death he had faded away into a wall of errors. That would have been a bad way to go.

                The girl who I suppose is my mom actually looked as though she suffered no injuries. However, sorrow etched her face and tears streamed down her cheeks. Her mouth was wide open in a sadden cry of loneliness, as though she was the only one left in the world. Out of everyone in this room, I think she was the only one who didn’t sustain any injuries. No wonder why she was lonely.

                None of these statues, were helpful with my trying to conquer my oncoming panic attack, but I didn’t want to reveal that I was freaking out a bit. Annabeth didn’t help my reading the plaques as she had done before.

                “‘Dirk Strider, Prince of Heart. They wait for he who would lead an army while destroying all souls’,” Annabeth started in the corner of Dirk, my father and moved onto my mom. “‘Roxy Lalonde, Rogue of Void. They wait for she, who would fill the void of the dead and create hope out of nothing.’”

                “Are these your parents?” Leo asked, looking in between my statue and Rose’s.

                “Yeah,” I answered.

                “Do you remember that happening?” Leo pointed to the sword in my chest in the statue.

                “No,” I lied.

                Annabeth continued on with Rose, “‘Rose Lalonde, Seer of Light. They wait for she who would breed lilacs out of the dead land.’”

                Annabeth walked over to mine then, and I closed my eyes trying not to follow back to the statue. I was glad I wore shades. Annabeth began to read out loud, “‘Dave Strider, Knight of Time. They wait for he who would drop it like it’s hot while the pimp’s in the crib . . . David Strider!”

                Leo and I had begun to laugh and Annabeth looked at me like it was my fault.

                “I had nothing to do with that,” I stated.

                “All of these other description are poetic and meaningful while yours . . .” Annabeth tried to blame it on me.

                “But it’s true,” I argued.

                That conversation ended as the pitter-patter of feet echoed throughout the hall to the back. I turned around and saw that the Dersite had returned, looking as though he had some important news.

                “Ha,” I said to Annabeth before I walked up to the Dersite, who began to frantically pull on my leg.

                “What’s up dude? Where’s Jack?” I asked, bending down.

                The little guy tried to point out of the hall and up in the sky, so I decided that it would be better to try something else. I pulled out a can of chalk from my sylladex and handed it to the little guy, “Draw it out dude.”

                “Why do you have that?” Annabeth asked.

                “Why not?” I questioned. To be honest, it reminded me of the Mayor (whoever that was) and another friend of mind, so I let it stick around.

                I watched as the Dersite scribbled on the ground and in a few seconds, a clear picture came into view against the purple stone ground. It was a shakily drawn and colored in golden circle with a gold moon, and an arrow pointing down at the planet. A rude caricature of Jack was drawn next to the arrow signifying where we wanted to go.

                “He’s already on Derse,” I stood up.

                “You must be good at Pictionary,” Leo commented.

                “Say little guy,” I looked to the Dersite. “Wanna come with us?”

                The Dersite ecstatically nodded his head.

                “Come on,” I waved my hand to beckon him to follow as I began to stroll out of the hall.

                “You’re bringing him with us?” Annabeth questioned.

                “Yeah, I need another ally against Cal,” I answered.

                “Dude, everyone hates Cal you aren’t alone,” Leo argued.

                “He can take us all down without a fight,” I insisted. “But we have to move. Jack’s on Prospit and we don’t know what he’s done yet.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey! I'm not dead. Just uninspired. For me it's better to wait until I have inspiration to make chapters good rather than churn them out and when reading it, feel as though I really didn't want to write that.  
> Speaking about that, let's talk about Blood of Olympus. If you haven't read it, this next bit is spoiler-free since I'm just talking about the writing.  
> I didn't enjoy the book as much as I have enjoyed Rick's other books. I mainly felt that way because it seemed a bit rushed, and when I read some of the chapters I felt the same way I do when I re-read a chapter I did not want to write but it was crucial to the story line. He handled Reyna's and Nico's chapters beautifully though, it's just that he was bored with everyone else and just wanted to get the book done. Also, not only did I feel as though the other parts were rushed, the ending was a bit anti-climatic.  
> So, I have elected to ignore the Blood of Olympus and continue on writing as though I had done before as though it had never come out. It will be easier that way since I don't have to try and add what happened in the book to previous chapters and it will simply be stated that they defeated Gaea. I am sorry if I have disappointed you but since I have this story already planned out along with all of the sequels to this story, it will be easier for me. I will continue serving up chapters as the inspiration comes to me though, because I do not want my chapters sounding like I did not want to write them.  
> If you now think that I didn't like the book and I hate it, I don't, it just wasn't as well-written as the others. I did enjoy Reyna's and Nico's parts, and other parts of the book were interesting, just not as well-written. Okay, moving on back to fanfiction.  
> I do have Chapter 19 written up. I just have to type it on my computer. I will have it sometime next week, or at most before the end of December. I just don't know what school will throw at me, and they are some Yogscast Christmas Livestreams I want to watch.  
> So Chapter Nineteen: Jason: Pooping Around on Propsit!


	19. Plz Update: Now What?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Important Announcement about 'The Bane of Skaia' from the author

I am here to answer a very important question that is on all your minds, about this current piece of literature, The Bane of Skaia. This is my reply to all of the messages sent asking ‘please update’.

 

No.

 

I haven’t been feeling good emotionally so that’s resulted with me stuffing my feelings and being salty. I finally decided to make a public announcement about this, however, my saltiness has not influenced my abandonment of this fic. I was thinking about how to end it before I got into an emotional slump. It was a bunch of other stuff.

 

  1.        Obviously, the last time I updated it was near the beginning of December. It’s now May. The only thing I’ve actually written and published since then is two Fairy Tail one-shots in a connected universe, and even then it was back in March. I have been writing, but I’m on a quest to improve my writing and tO TRY AND FINALLY FINISH A FUCKING MULTI-CHAPTER FIC ( _ahem_ obviously not this one). So during this time I’ve been writing in journals, I’ve started a couple stories thAT I’VE NEVER FINISHED, along with various ideas and drabbles for these ideas.
  2.        I’m not as into Homestuck or Percy Jackson as I once was. Heroes of Olympus is over, Homestuck just came back from a hiatus and I’m still keeping up with it since the story is about to get good, but I have found other stuff. I started watching Fairy Tail last summer, I got back into the Yogscast within the last year, and I’m in the middle of One Piece (EPISODE 422 BABY . . . still like three hundred to go) so I’m not that into writing Homestuck or Percy Jackson fanfiction. I still love it, I’m just not into it enough at the moment to write about it.
  3.        The Homestuck timeline just got massively fucked up and I know I said I would continue as though nothing has changed but like fuck everything is changed now I don’t want to ignore it. Like, I changed the Davekat and then Davekat became canon, and I don’t want to go back and fix everything.
  4.        I just don’t want to? That’s a valid reason. I’m not inspired to write. If I tried to force it out, it would sound bad.



 

Okay, so before you flip out that you’re not gonna ever see the ending, I have the solution. You have two options:

 

  1.        I can release the list of ideas I had for the rest of Bane of Skaia and all of the sequels after it. The lists aren’t finished though. That’s all I had planned so far. Let’s just say it’s a happy ending.
  2.        That chapter I mentioned at the end of my last update? Chapter 19: Pooping Around on Prospit? Well I realized that in it Jack talked and it didn’t continue well with Chapter 18 so I never typed it, but I will type it up as is without fixing anything (I was probably just going to have Leo give Jack something to talk with), and then continue on with the plan in part one.



 

Those are the two options. This is so at least you can get the full story without being left with a cliff-hanger for the rest of your life. Leave a number in the comments so I know what to do (I’d rather do one because I’m lazy).

You can do nothing to change my mind. I will not finish this story as fully-written out. As for my others stories before this, such as XBurb of Aspect . . . those are done as well, if you have read them as well. I’m sorry that I have to end it like this, but I feel that I should at least be honest and close it.

 


	20. Update 6/23/15

So this is a just a quick update because I wrote that last update in May and now it's June.

For me, I've finished school, so I don't have any tests to prepare for or projects to do. I am in the middle of driver's ed, wasting two hours everyday doing shitty book work and going on a two-hour drive at least once a week. That shouldn't get in the way too much. I did just, though, fuck up my wrist just by writing and drawing though . . . and I continue to write and draw. I got a better wrist brace so I'm okay to write. I just finished a 10499 word one shot (it's a Yogscast Minecraft!Fairy Tail) that I think is pretty cool, and there's a multi-chapter Jerza fic that I haVEN'T FINISHED but I have like over twenty chapters of and I only planned on having around twenty-five so maybe I can start progressively putting those up and get inspired to finish it. 

For the story, I'll try and write up Chapter 19: Pooping Around Prospit, or as I like to call it, Jason Fucks Up, in the next three weeks. Driver's ed will be done after next week, exclduing my last couple drives. I just have to find where I wrote it and go through the tedious task of actually typing it up. After that, I'll show you guys my plans for the rest of the way and I'll add some of my comments onto it anyway, because it's been like over a year or so since I wrote that and my writing has changed. 

So that's it. I may actually publish some stuff, as a lot of the stuff I've been writing are just scenes out of the big picture of a story that I don't have enough ideas to write. Thanks to those who commented, and I am feeling better! School's out, which is nice, but driver's ed is giving me some anxiety. I'll try to get you guys Chapter 19 soon.


	21. Jason: Popping Around on Prospit

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I finally did it! I had this typed up for a while but I kept on forgetting to upload it. I remembered now and instead of just putting it off another day and forgetting again, I decided to get it over with. Here, is Chapter 19, AKA Jason Fucks Everything Up.

                We arrived in Prospit late in the evening, but it seemed that life was just starting in the golden city. It was a scene out of Beauty and the Beast: Prospitian greeting each other early in the morning as the day began for them.

                I only knew this because Dave split us up again: Frank, Hazel and Nico went west; Piper, Leo and I went south; while Dave and Annabeth went west. To the south there was the city’s wall, and we bounced towards it as we looked for something out of the ordinary.

                “There!” we finally found something strange-a dead Prospitian lying on the wall. His red blood spills over his elaborate clothes and trickles onto the gold pavement. Protruding out of his hard shell is a knife.

                “How are you supposed to check if one of these guys is alive or dead?” Leo asked, poking the dead Prospitian with his foot.

                “I’m pretty sure he’s dead, Leo,” Piper sighed.

                “Okay, but I thought this place was supposed to be Metropolis,” Leo continued.

                “Even Metropolis has its villians,” I replied.

                “THAT’S PRETTY DEEP PRETTY BOY! HEE HEE HOO HOO HAA HAA!” Lil Cal cackled.

                “Yeah, thanks Superman,” Leo added.

                “Psst!”

                “Be quiet Cal,” I shushed the wriggling puppet on my back.

                “THAT WASN’T ME!” Cal shouted.

                “Psst!”

                “Then who is it?” Piper looked around. “There!”

                Piper pointed up at one of the towers to both sides of us. There’s a Dersite behind golden bars, looking out of place in the light city.

                “Psst!” he continued.

                “What do you want?” I asked.

                The Dersite stuck his arm out and pointed it at the dead boy.

                “Do you know who did it?” I continued.

                The Dersite nodded his head.

                “Can you tell us?” I asked.

                The Dersite stuck his tongue out in a disgusted facing, probably trying to display that we can’t communicate with him.

                “I’ve got something,” Leo floats up, bringing the trapped Dersite a black device. “I was making it for the Dersite on our ship. Maybe you can use it.”

                The Dersite takes it greedily, and begins to speak, “Yeah, I saw who killed the bas-poor innocent guy.”

                “Who?” Piper asked.

                “Jack Noir? Who else? He’s uh, a terror on this land,” the Dersite explained.

                “Do you know where he went?” I asked.

                “Yeah, I could show ya . . . but, ahhhhhh I’m kinda stuck,” the Dersite explains as he taps the metal bars in the window. “You could, maybe, free me, and I can help ya all ya want.”

                “Sure, who are you?” Leo asked as he pulled a saw out of his tool belt.

                “Uh . . . why don’tcha just call me Bec,” the Dersite explained. The bars fall from his prison and he jumped out, strolling over to the killed Propitian.

                “Where did Jack go?” Piper asked Bec.

                “Ta the White Queen’s castle, a’ course,” Bec explained as he pulled the knife from the Prospitain’s body, wiping the blood off with the Prospitian’s clothes. “Ta get ‘er, well ya obviously know, ta get ‘er ring!”

                “Where is her ring? Isn’t there the Black Queen’s ring?” Leo asked.

                “That bitch!” Bec exclaimed, turning around to face Leo, clean knife in his hand. Something in my gut said to take the knife away, but another voice said that it was nothing. Bec continued, “Well, Jack can’t find ‘er ring so he wants the White Queen’s ring ta have power again.”

                “Why do you know so much about Jack?” Piper asked.

                “I . . . uh . . . used ta work with the filthy bastard. He owes me money,” Bec explains. “Now, are we goin’ or what?”

                “With the murder weapon?” Leo asked.

                “Of course,” Bec scoffed. “Why waste a perfectly good stabbin’ knife?”

                “I really don’t know why,” Leo replied.

                “Now let’s get ta tha castle,” Bec declared.

                “Can we really trust him?” Piper whispered in my ear.

                “Yes,” I said without hesitation. I started to fly, picking Bec up and led us in the direction her pointed us in.

                As we flew, something in the back of my head seemed wrong. Lil Cal at the moment was oddly quiet as Bec went into an in-depth analysis of how much he hates the Black Queen and the uniform he had to wear when he worked for her. Something told me that this was wrong. I should ditch Cal and Bec, but a louder voice calmed all my fears. It told me that everything was perfectly fine, and I could trust both of them. Cal was a gift, and we were lucky to stumble upon Bec. With Bec, we can get the ring before Dave. That seemed perfect.

                “And man, the hats were so shit! I could’ve stabbed a bastard just for how much I hated the hats! I did stab a bastard cause I hated the hats!” Bec shouted as he waved the knife around. “Wait, this is our stop! There, through that window! The throne room is right there! I can almost smell that ring!”

                “How do you know that?” Piper asked.

                “The layouts of tha Derse and Prospit castles are tha same,” Bec explained as I flew him through the window, Piper and Leo following.

                I let Bec down as we landed. He took a quick look around and began to slink towards the empty, golden throne.

                “Where’s Jack?” leo asked.

                “Hang on a second,” Bec replied. He messed around with one of the arms of the throne until he opened a small compartment. “Ha! Stupid bitch, leavin’ in a shitty spot!”

                “Uh . . . Bec?” Piper tried to get the Dersite’s attention as he pulled a golden ring out of the compartment. It has four glowing pearls on it, and it pulsates with power. Bec looked down at it hungrily. I stare at the ring as well, fixated by the power it held, though it can’t do much for me.

                “Jason!” Piper grabbed my wrist, dragging my out of my daze. Cal wriggled disappointedly on my back.

                “Bec!” I shouted. He looked up, scowling angrily and looking like he was going to use that stabbing knife of his. I draw my sword, “Where’s Jack?”

                Bec growled, “Right here.”

                Bec (or Jack) slipped the ring on and he transformed. He howled as his mouth grew into a snout with blood-curling, jagged teeth. Ears perked at attention grew out of the top of his head. One arm disappears but a sword grows out of the middle of his stomach, looking quite sharper than mine. Black wings uncurl from his back, slowly beginning to beat and raising Jack off the floor. Around him, green, yellow and white energy began to crackle and pulsate

                “Thanks for helping,” Jack drew the sword out of his stomach with his one arm, snarling and growling as he does. He pulled back, looking as though he’s ready to strike, “Grave stuffers.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Huh. Well. That's a nice place to end the actually chapters of the story. Next up is what would happen for the rest of the Bane of Skaia. Until next time, good day.


	22. Bane of Skaia: The Rest of the Story

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alright, so let’s get this party started. This is, The Bane of Skaia:

                When we last left the crew, Jason had just fucked up and brought Jack to the ring of the White Queen. Meanwhile, Dave and Annabeth are in the White Queen’s castle as well, trying to find the White Queen to talk about handing over the ring to them. They end up in the throne room just in time to see Jason fuck up. Jack tosses all of them off Prospit and they fall down onto Skaia, leaving Frank, Hazel and Nico up there. They land in the one castle where Mom Lalonde and Dad Egbert died, as shown by their bodies. Dave tries to wrap his head around how they’re still here, as they died over three years ago, and tries not to punch Jason.

                At the castle, Dave and Jason start to fight, as Dave insists that Jason should get rid of Cal, considering what he did to his Bro (as revealed by the recent updates). Annabeth tells them to both get their head in the game, as she, Leo and Piper do try to destroy Cal. However, even after Leo manages to set Lil Cal on fire, he’s still wriggling away. Finally, Dave gets Jason to tell Lil Cal to go far, far away, and Lil Cal disappears for the time being.

                Leo gets a hold of Frank, Nico, and Hazel, who are going back to the Argo 2 to come down to Skaia. Dave takes his time to think things over, and realizes that this universe is some sort of splinter universe or Dream Bubble from where he played the game, since the Beta Medium should have been destroyed in the Scratch, but here it is (evidence from Mom Lalonde’s and Dad Egbert’s corpses, two towers on the moons, how Jack transformed). Dave wonders if that has to do anything in the future, but Hazel, Frank and Nico arrive. They decide to rest for a while before continuing on.

                Dave decides to fight Jack on his own, but Annabeth and Jason stop him, insisting that they come with him (Jason, because he feels bad that he started it, and Annabeth because she doesn’t trust Dave on his own). Dave agrees and they fly up to Prospit, finding Jack already causing havoc. They start to fight, but Dave ends up in his own personal tussle with Jack, causing the two of them to fall to Skaia again.

                As he falls and fights Jack, Dave regains all his memories, including fighting a Jack with the powers of Lord English, not this one (as shown by the most recent updates), so Dave realizes that this fight is much easier. He cuts the ring off of Jack’s finger Hobbit-style, defeating him, though by that time Dave crashes into Skaia hard. He loses consciousness, but he has the ring (and Jack’s finger by extension) in his hand.

                While unconscious, Dave dreams of Hussie again, in a land of horses (the one (Vriska) was on with Meenah). Hussie explains that once again this is just the start, and soon he’ll meet up with his friends. The Medium he’s in, is just a fragment and will soon disappear. He’ll have to return home to his new world and they’ll have to return to a doomed timeline where John and Roxy are from, as that Condescension is planning on entering another Earth: the Earth of the demigods. Of course, he has to wait to enter his home until they’re ready on the other side. Hussie then kicks Dave to wake him up, and he wakes up surrounded by all the demigods. Dave shows off Jack’s finger and does a half-assed Golum impression, before Annabeth asks what they’re going to do next. Dave says, “We’ll have to roll the credits, since for now, our part is over. We just have to wait for your hunky boyfriend on the other side to do his part.”

                Then _Hooked on a Feeling_ starts playing. The credits roll. Other than that Hussie owns Homestuck and Rick Riordan owns all the Percy Jackson characters, everything else is credited to me. It’s styled like the opening credits in Month Python and the Holy Grail.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So that’s how I plan the rest of the Bane of Skaia will go. I did make up like half of this while I was writing up, as I came up with some good plot hole fillers and we’ve gotten new information and major plot changes since I came up with this. So, it’s definitely not the original idea I had, as the story’s evolved over time just on its own, but I feel like this is much better than what I started off with it. I’ve definitely grown as a writer since I’ve started this, and I hope I’ll grow some more.  
> The next installment in this series would have been the Titan of Time, which was originally the Thief of Time but I believe that in my list of godtiers I gave that title to Hermes, so like how Caliborn’s and Calliope’s titles are like a step up (I’m not looking up the technically term right now), Titan would be one of those. Here, we get a look at what’s going on at Percy’s end of the deal in the New World, and I’ll get that up soon.


End file.
